


Bound: Part I - Bound

by Darkflames_Pyre



Series: The Bound Series [1]
Category: Thunderbirds
Genre: Bound Trilogy, Bound Universe, Family, Film-fix fic, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Illness, International Rescue, Other, Siblings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-10-05
Updated: 2015-10-05
Packaged: 2018-04-24 21:56:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 20
Words: 44,883
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4936801
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Darkflames_Pyre/pseuds/Darkflames_Pyre
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><img/> </p><p>Space. I don't know how old I was when my fascination with it began, but I remember the day it nearly took the lives of almost every member of my family. Most of all, I recall the day that my greatest love both ruined and saved my life. Contains some extremely scattered coarse language and some distressing themes. Movie-verse.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Impact

**Author's Note:**

> A/N: This is the start of a multi-chapter fic, and is the direct result of reading way too many T-birds stories, and watching the movie and wondering how John managed to survive the impact to 'Five as unscathed as he did, among other things. This is my interpretation and subsequent backstory of what could have occurred had he come out of it worse off. Honestly, I think I'll end up torturing him way more than needed. Oh, well.
> 
> Please, read and enjoy!

  _Space. It is around us all the time. Whether it is the air we breathe, or the infinite reaches of the cosmos that lies beyond our atmosphere, it is always surrounding us, supporting us, but it is also harsh and merciless in response to those who are uncaring of its dangers. I can't remember how old I was when my fascination with it began, but I do remember the day that it almost took the lives of my father and almost every one of my brothers. But most clearly, I recall the day that my greatest love simultaneously destroyed and saved my life._

_~~~~~~~_

It ended normally; the day before my world collapsed. Let me clarify. My kind of normal is not necessarily what the rest of the planet may call it. You see, I don't even live on the planet ninety per-cent of the year. As the space monitor for a secret organisation that is for all intents and purposes my father's seventh baby, I spend my days on Thunderbird Five; the satellite station that has gained the glorious moniker of 'the tin can' from my brothers. After I had called in for the 'evening report', my dad had informed me of the day's goings-on on the island, and we had shared an amused shaking of heads over the many similarities between Scott and my youngest brother, Alan. Both of them will fervently deny any such relation barring that of blood if the topic is broached, which I find hilarious.

Many people would consider talking to their father over a vast distance of ocean, air and atmosphere incomprehensibly strange, but that's normal for me. After signing off the communications link, I ran a practiced eye over the numerous consoles in the control room, and their readouts, confirming that everything was as should be. Then, yawning widely, I stood up, rubbing my gritty eyes. The oil rig disaster from the early hours of the morning had been a long, tiring affair, and I had no doubt that I would be sleeping soundly. It had taken all of my considerable will just to make it to the relatively early hour of nine-pm.

How I could be so tired from just sitting and talking, I had no idea. I had been more exhausted than usual over the last few weeks, but I figured I could place the blame on the heap of rescues my brothers had been called out to. If I then added the fact that I would be trading places with Virgil in a few short days for my week dirt-side, I wasn't surprised. The three week stretch usually leaves me more tired than not in the last couple of days.

Yawning again as I flicked the light switch to cut the illumination to the control room, I headed to bed. I was asleep as soon as my head dropped onto the pillow.

##

The next morning, as the automated chiming sound that served as my alarm rang into my mind, I groaned in annoyance. Once again, for the sixth time in almost as many days, my bedclothes and sheets were drenched in sweat. The glitch in the climate system was really screwing with my mind. I couldn't seem to find anything physically wrong with the console in charge of the operation, but I figured that maybe Brains might have more luck, and would be able to repair it. Making yet another mental note to let my father know of the minor malfunction, I grimaced. This meant another use of the tiny washer and dryer in the room next to the kitchenette.

As much as I could do the chore without any major catastrophes — like turning underwear pink, as Gordon was wont to do — men really weren't meant to wash this much. Okay. So it was only three or four times in the entire three-week cycle that I had to wash my own apparel and bedclothes, but honestly — if you asked me — six times in a row was just getting to be ridiculous. Making a face at the sensation of damp, sticky material parting from my skin, I drew myself out from beneath the blankets and sheets, planting my bare feet on the rug that covered the floor of my sleeping quarters. Drawing myself up to my full five-foot-eleven height, I held still as the now-expected head-rush disoriented me for a moment. Not a second later, it had formed into a low-grade headache.

As it was easy to ignore, I rolled my head on my shoulders and headed to the tiny bathroom.

##

Twenty minutes later found me showered and dressed in a fresh flight suit; the clothes washer on, and my too-long platinum-blonde hair swept back with the last dregs of my hair gel. Glancing at the clock as I settled into my chair in the control room, with my breakfast of hot, instant coffee balanced on my knee, I was amazed to see how long I'd slept. It was ten am. I had had over twelve hours sleep, though I felt only a little less tired than the night before. Looking at the mug in front of me, I briefly considered the thought that maybe I should have more caffeine to keep me awake, but then I grinned to myself, shaking my head. As if! I'd be turning into Scott or Dad before I knew it, both of whom would die if they were deprived of the strong black muck they drank for too long. Reaching forward, I flicked the switch on the nearest console and waited for the system to commence running through the diagnostic scans. Despite the efficiency with which Brains had designed the machines on Thunderbird Five, it would still take a good fifteen to twenty minutes for the checks to be completed to ensure that everything was running smoothly.

My headache was getting worse. I didn't know if it was because I hadn't drunk enough water, or because my brain had decided that it had had too much shut-eye, but I decided that some Tylenol wouldn't hurt. I made one last check of the weather screen, and went to rise, intending to head over to the medicine kit over on the far side of the room. It happened quite suddenly. " _Warning_!" The shrill klaxon-like alarm of the proximity alarms blared into my mind.

" _Impact imminent!_ " Without thinking, amid the cacophony of sound and the blood red of the flashing lights from the screen to my left, I lunged forward to the button that would link me to base.

"Thunderbird Five to Tracy Island! Mayday! Mayd-!" I was cut off as I felt myself get blown off my feet. Half-realising that I was tumbling through the air, I reached out for something, anything that might have possibly hold enough weight to prevent me from slamming into the consoles nearest the airlock.

Howling incoherently as time seemed to stop in its tracks, I felt most of my back and side impact with something hard, rattling my teeth in my head. It sent a wave of indescribable agony tearing through me a split second before the back of my head cracked into the wall, sending me plummeting into darkness.

 

* * *

As a note, I wish to establish a few things that I have mentioned throughout conversations and chapters that I've posted over the three years since I began this trilogy. This is also posted on my profile page, but if you're like me, once you see a story you don't actually look at the profile page until after you've read, (if at all), so it's a good idea in my estimation to stick it in here too, at the very beginning. :)

 

My intention with writing in the movie universe - aside from creating a story, and making an attempt at portraying characters that I have an indelible link with, as well as honing my writing skills - is to in essence, 'fix up' the numerous technical, characterisation and storyline errors that occurred in the farce that was Thunderbirds 2004.

 

There are things that I did like about that film - not the least that it was my first real introduction to the concept of International Rescue and the Tracy boys, if grossly misinterpreted beyond the vague recollections I had of 90s reruns. I loved the updated depiction of the craft, the bright, colourful interpretation of Tracy Island, I adored the updates to the uniforms, and the incorporation of helmets and basic protective gear that the original series never had, and I also loved the fact that three actors that I had immense respect for, played three of the most iconic characters brought from the original series. However, as we know, there were a number of problems and issues that most certainly did not give any credence or indeed, any respect to that iconic original. The fact that we were stuck with three teenagers - one of whom never actually existed originally - and dumped into a world where those three unqualified, frankly spoiled children were apparently 'forced' to save the day, how they made no reference to Grandma, a force of nature and an important character in her own right and how characters were either de-aged and over-aged, quite frankly sucked. I hated how four of the brothers had barely any screen time other than being stuck up on a space station and made to flail helplessly, more or less, when IR is meant to have an agent's network that could have assisted them in exactly that sort of scenario. The fact that those Thunderbirds machines are able to be filmed, where in the original, utmost secrecy and the wiping of tapes were implemented, well, that was almost the worst part... Those are just the tip of the iceberg.

 

So yes, the 2004 movie is scorned by some people, and that is perfectly okay, but my aim is a writer is to find a way to solve the puzzle of those self-same issues, to create a reasonable, believable plot to repair some of the damage that the film created, to use my own original story to depict the Tracys in the way that I feel they should have been portrayed, how they should have been closely developed as a salute to the original series that started it all.

 

As a writer, I am a firm believer in writing what you want to write, using and manipulating the tools in front of you to work for you and create something that you are not only proud to have written, but that you would be happy to read yourself. This is a challenge that I set myself at the age of nineteen, and is still in the works, three years later. I have four other trilogies planned for this universe, both set before and after this one to round out the 'Bound-verse' as I have named it, in it's entirety, so in all likelihood I will still be here ten years from now, completing it to the extent I wish it to be, but I am enjoying every moment of it.<br />

With that in mind, should you be willing to put aside your prejudices and begin to read my fanworks, I wish to tell you that I have altered some things with character appearances, some situations and references to the film in order to more fully translate into a believable fic, that also pays respect to the 60s original, as should have been done in the first place.

 

\- Gordon, yes, has green eyes, Virgil hazel, and Scott blue-violet ones in these stories, which are a fan tweak of my own, recognising the differences between tv and that film, and therefore adding my own little touches. However, their hair colours are the same as the film, except for Gordon's - who having been very indignant at discovering they'd not gotten a redhead to play him, I refused to think of as anything but a ginger (damn you, Thunderbirds Are Go, though I do adore you for you your other improvements!) - you will learn the explanation for that in due time, taken in complete and utter wow-that's-awesome shamelessness from Darkhelmetj's fantastic Movie-verse fanfiction, The Winds of Advent. Scott still gets shot down in the Air Force - in accordance with the Bereznik references in the old Thunderbirds comics, though it is Afghanistan in my stories, due to the lack of information on said comics.

 

\- Also, as in Original Series canon, as specified by Chris Bentley's The Complete Book of Thunderbirds, Gordy still has his hydrofoil accident, despite the younger ages (as sourced from Alex Pang's Thunderbirds: X-Ray Cross Sections - part of the official film merchandise released in 2004). In referring to this, as of March 2058, when this fic is set, Scott is twenty-five, John is twenty-two, Virgil is twenty, Gordon is eighteen and Alan (much as it irritates the life out of me) is fourteen. Tin-Tin is fifteen, and Fermat (ew), twelve. Explanations for my keeping in line with those movie-verse correlations are featured with further reasoning within this set of stories.

 

\- I have also, with her permission, made subtle references to That Girl Six's backstory for Scott, which you will see if you also peruse my multiple oneshots with the tag 'Boundverse' in their summaries, which, yay, new readers! aside, I do recommend you look at for information's sake.

 

\- I have adopted for Grandma, the fan-created moniker of 'Ruth', as there has never been a canonical name for her, and that beautifully rustic, reliable name suits her as well as any. My credit for that goes to the writer who first referred to her as such, although I cannot make a proper reference to them, as I am sadly unsure as to who they actually are... The same goes for the use of the Mercury Seven Astronauts' second names as correlating with the Tracys, as they were never actually given middle names. If anyone does know of either of these original sources, please feel free to enlighten me, because I would love to give credit where credit is due.

  
So. If you have slogged your way through this essay, an extremely heartfelt thank-you, and whether you do choose to read on or not, I appreciate the time you have given me. If you do honour me by continuing on, please feel free to contact me with any errors and/or discrepancies you find, because aside from chapter five onwards of Part III: Fulcrum, and the majority of my oneshots on fanfic.net, all stories posted prior to this date are unbetaed. I hope you enjoy my universe as much as I have enjoyed creating it. I look forward to hearing from you, but most of all, thank you for taking this time. It is extremely humbling.

 

 

 


	2. Sparks

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If not for Sylvia and Gerry Anderson, I would not be able to play in this wonderful playground, so no, I do not own the Thunderbirds.

I don't know how long I was out.

The first thing I registered was agony. There were no words that I could use to describe how much I hurt. It was there thumping in my brain, rattling my bones, and shuddering through every inch of my apparently battered body.

My first coherent thought was something along the lines of a groaned 'emggrhh'. Not very eloquent, I know, but my head felt like a jackhammer was determinedly drilling through it, my back felt like it had been bent in half at the base, and all I could see were some awesome-looking stars. But the thing that I noticed the most was the fact that I couldn't feel my right arm.

I knew that I had a concussion, a really huge one, judging by the feel of it, and it was a very real possibility that I could have spinal injuries judging by how hard I had hit the wall, but all I could think about was the apparent detachment of my arm. Funny how that works.

All of those thoughts barely took a second to generate in my brain, before I suddenly remembered that there was a reason why I was splayed out on the hard floor.

Apparently, opening my eyes was much harder than I was previously led to believe: though I sure as hell could feel them moving, there didn't seem to be any light filtering into them. If there was, I couldn't see it.

Hmm…  I concluded, as I felt them twitch. Definitely open.

Squinting across to my right, I finally registered a faintly flickering light, somewhat obscured by a large, solid-looking object, and it all suddenly made sense. I must admit that at that point, I felt rather stupid.

For a certified genius, surely a little bit of a knock on the head shouldn't have made me that slow to comprehend? No, I must have clonked my head really hard, if it was taking that long for me to come to such a simple conclusion.

Logical thinking re-emerged as I blinked and my focus moved, attempting to see the ceiling through eyes that were attempting to adjust. Frowning, I remembered that non-response to light was fairly common with head injuries; that and the fact I was fairly slow for my night vision to kick in at the best of times. I was just glad that I knew who I was… and where…

Damnit!

Supernovae burst in my eyes as I moved without consciously intending to, abruptly remembering the cause of the reason why it felt like I'd been run over by Thunderbird Two.

Waiting somewhat tentatively, as the sudden flare of pain sensors faded to a calmer, steadier stabbing, I steeled myself to shift to a more suitable position for self-assessment.

Breathing as deeply as I could, I gingerly rolled myself to the left, into a half-seated position; almost biting through my bottom lip as abused muscles and bone stretched. The slight movement sent pain zapping through every inch of me.

Figuring the Band-Aid approach would be best in this situation, I raised my good arm above my head as I groped for something stable that I could use to pull myself up on.

Fumbling, my hand brushed across the edge of a console that seemed relatively intact, the metal plating seemingly untouched by the flying debris that had joined the rest of my ship in scattering to the four winds. Without hesitation, I curled my fingers around the top of the shelving as best I could; digging my nails into the groove it presented and clenching my teeth in painful anticipation.

Three, two, one…

A pained scream tore through my lips as agony, worse than anything I had ever felt before, ripped through my formerly numb right arm. The other, previously more painful injuries paled to almost insignificance as the dead weight of the appendage dropped from its place in my lap.

It dragged on shredded muscle and tortured nerves, and I wished for the blackness to swallow me again. What little I could see of the station in the non-light whirled sickeningly about me, and I sucked in numerous sharp breaths in an attempt not to vomit all over myself.

Conclusion;  I thought sardonically, once the agony had receded to a point where I could actually think.  That… was a terrible idea.  I grimaced, nausea swimming in my stomach, and I coughed, praying that I wouldn't puke.

That would be nasty.

Great observation, Sherlock. A voice, one that sounded a lot like Gordon suddenly retorted.

I sighed. My sarcasm was intact. My sanity… quite possibly not. I found that I wasn't as worried about it as I probably should have been; which was slightly alarming to the part of me that cared.

Once I was reasonably sure that any future movement wouldn't bring up last night's dinner, I decided that I wouldn't even think about attempting to stand; a belly crawl across the station seemed a more likely way to not injure myself any further. I only hoped it ended with a better outcome than the last plan I had devised.

First things first though. I gritted my teeth as I slowly went to raise my bad arm, left palm supporting the elbow as I gingerly attempted to determine how badly I had screwed the joint. A hiss erupting between my teeth gave me my answer.

"Okay," I whispered hoarsely to myself; the first human sounds I had made since I woke. "I am so not using that arm."

##

It took me forever to drag my way over to the main control console.

Painfully skirting fallen bits of unidentified plating and snarled cable, I refused to allow myself to think of what I would do if all the systems were out. A second passed as I paused for breath, and then I scoffed. Clearly some of the operations of 'Five were functional; the bare minimum of the life-support systems and the gravity generator at least. If they weren't I would be a corpse, my body cooling on the metal floor right now.

Nope, scratch that; if the artificial gravity had failed, my body would be grey and floating along with all the other matter that made up the shreds of my poor destroyed ship.

After many pained grunts and exhaled hissings of pain, I finally reached my destination, lacking the energy to actually do anything but slump against the console. The mere effort it took to breathe momentarily quelled my desperate need to inform my family that yes, I had survived the impact, and no; I was not okay, thank-you Scott.

Knowing that I probably didn't really have any time to rest longer than it took to calm my breathing, I decided that I would take my chances on further aggravating my injuries, and painfully raised myself with my good arm.

I gasped painfully as what felt like thousands of hot knives stabbed their way into my lower back, a tingling in my legs letting me know that they didn't quite appreciate the way I was treating them.

Gritting my teeth against a further wave of nausea, I shifted my position enough to reach for the button that would link me to base. Using my bad arm for that was a little bit of a bad idea, but I fought through the astonishing pain and the limb's non-cooperation to get the job done. My eyes flickered to the screen at my right. The previously unheard computerised voice, tartly informing me there was less than twenty percent power remaining in the emergency generator.

Damn.

Praying that the feed hadn't been too damaged by the hit, I fumblingly pressed the comm. link and spoke shakily into the mike set into the console.

"I'm losing all power..." Sparks flew from a nearby console, and I flinched as it sent needles jabbing into my aching brain. I ignored it, stubbornly clinging to the unit; my arm and shoulder trembling with the effort of holding my torso above the ground.

I sobbed slightly, my jaw trembling with pain and exhaustion. I didn't want to die alone. I didn't want to die, period, but I couldn't deny what a precarious position I found myself in. It was one of my deepest fears. You might think it strange, as the majority of my time was spent on my own, even when I was on the island, but honestly; everyone needs some kind of human interaction, especially when in your final hours. It was something I wasn't likely to get, seeing as I was currently orbiting the earth in what amounted to a hunk of metal and alloy.

I gasped harshly, hoping. "Repeat, I'm losing all power…"

"Hold on, John. We're coming in."

Sweetest of sweet mercies… it was my dad's voice, crackly with static, and loud in the comparative silence of harsh breathing and dying machinery. But 'they' were close; some part of my desperate mayday call must have gotten through. Then, "Gordon, prepare for immediate docking…"

Thank-you, Lord! At least one of my brothers was with him.

Not being bothered to hear any more, I slumped, wobbly-limbed with mingled shock and relief against the floor of the station, hearing indistinct voices over the link, and the loud hiss of the airlock.

"John!" Without realising that my eyes had closed, my lids jerked open at the worry in my father's usually stern voice. I blurrily focused on him, and the profiles of my brothers as they entered; all wearing IR's distinctive flight-suits. My dad grabbed my shoulders as I gasped out involuntarily, flinching slightly as my nerve endings fizzed again.

"Boy, am I glad to see you guys." I grinned weakly, groaning as I went to slide sideways, dizzily shifting until I felt firmness at my back.

"Easy, John, you're hurt."

Really Dad?  I wanted to retort, to point out in all sarcasm that it hurt to hell, but I bit my tongue as the world spun lightly around my head.

Indistinct words echoed in my ears, and then I blinked to see Virgil next to me.

"Hey bro," he smiled worriedly. "I'm just going to check you out. Tell me what hurts." He pulled a first-aid kit out from his pack as he spoke, and I wondered blearily, where I should start.


	3. Prisoner

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: If not for Sylvia and Gerry Anderson, I would not be able to play in this wonderful playground, so no, I do not own the Thunderbirds.

I don't think I had quite registered how much trouble we were in, until I heard Scott's panicked shout.

Virgil had examined me somewhat using the old follow-the-flashlight-in-the-eyes routine. It made me flinch with pain, but I moved my eyes after it nevertheless, which seemed to please him inordinately.

Then, without any regard to if I felt up to it, he 'helped' me to strip the top half of my formerly clean flight suit, and slid a pair of scissors up the sleeveless white shirt that I was wearing underneath.

I didn't want to look at the evidence of what being thrown around like a rag-doll does to a person, so I stared determinedly off to one side at Scott's apparent perusal of the still-running programs, gritting my teeth hard as Virgil inspected my shoulder with a lot of poking and prodding, coming to the intelligent conclusion that yes, the joint was definitely dislocated.

My head was still whirling around me somewhat disconcertingly. I wondered if the vertigo I was experiencing was completely to do with my head injury, or if it was a rather intriguing addition to the headache I'd had before the world had gone to hell.

And I still wanted my damn pain medication, although I could freely admit to myself that I needed something much stronger than Tylenol to combat the painful earthquake that was going off in my brain and the rest of my body.

"John." Virgil's voice dragged me from that thought as he laid a hand on the console above my head, bracing himself on his heels. He'd apparently come back from somewhere. That confused me.

I hadn't even noticed him leave, but I saw my dad kneel next to me, and I assumed that my brother had gone to fetch him for something. "I'm going to have to put your arm back in place. Dad's going to assist, but it's going to hurt. A lot."

No duh. I thought sarcastically and then, I grimaced.  Geez, John. You're really in a bad mood today!  I sniggered.  Huh! I wonder why, dumbass.

I froze for a second. I really hoped I hadn't said that out loud; the situation was really messing with my mind. I was having a conversation with myself, for cripes sake! I sighed in relief as I didn't get any expressions more worried than they were already, and I assumed that I was in the clear.

I found myself nodding numbly as Dad wound his arms around my chest and torso, my left arm clamped tight against my side; Virgil holding my injured limb firmly in his grasp.

"On the count of three." he told me.

No ! I thought in panic, already dreading the renewed bolts of agony.  I'm not ready! Oh no…. Oh crap, oh crap, oh crap…

"One… two…"

For the second time in half an hour, an unholy screech echoed around the station.

I didn't know what the others were thinking, but I would have quite happily throttled my brother and his apparent inability to count to a number as simple as three. However, my stomach and brain had other ideas.

One of them wanted to eject its rather sparse contents across the floor of the station, the other was content to simply drop me into a vortex of tumbling constellations. Thankfully, it was the latter one that eventuated.

Through the rushing in my ears, I dimly registered my dad saying something, and the warm arms released my torso, but it wasn't until the brother who called himself a medic waved what I unpleasantly realised were smelling salts beneath my nose that my mind returned from the land of the never-nevers.

Man. I thought, my eyes watering.  That definitely clears the sinuses.

As I sent a death glare at my middle brother, the spark of worry in his eyes disappeared for a moment as he smiled wickedly and stowed the tiny bottle back in its pocket in the med kit.

##

I was still sat somewhat awkwardly up against the console, biting my lip viciously as Virgil strapped my bad arm into a grey support sling, when Scott suddenly spoke up.

There was a tone of alarm in his voice that worried me, struggling to see his profile as it lit up sporadically from the sparking consoles. "We got a constant warning light on our E.B.S system!"

That wasn't a good thing. Yup I know, again with the obviousness.

I had a head injury, remember?

That light meant that someone was trying to gain control of IR's systems without the password and it couldn't be Brains, because obviously he'd just initiate contact directly to Thunderbird Five, using our standard call-signs as well as the code itself. The red meant that someone had hacked into the system.

Maybe it was Alan again, wanting to be a part of the family business; though he was really far too young to consider the seriousness of things. Dad would have his hide if it was.

Hold on . My runaway, illogical brain suddenly stopped in its tracks; my original train of thought officially derailed amid the bright light of sudden reasoning.

Why in the hell would my brother and his friends be trying to take control away from 'Five? Neither Brains nor Kyrano would even let them take a single step into the room if command and control were in sequence! And although he was an idiot sometimes, my youngest brother wouldn't put our lives in danger for a matter of mulish teenage pride.

Suddenly, the hit on the station took on a whole new meaning.

Realising in my panicked epiphany that I had missed an important part of the conversation, I was quite startled when my dad suddenly joined Virgil in tucking an arm around my back and hauling me to my feet.

"John, we gotta move!" As I leaned heavily on the pair of them, more-so on Virgil than Dad, because he was shorter than me, and it took the strain off of my right shoulder, it didn't escape my notice that the flare of pain that lanced up my spine was slowly increasing with every movement.

However, over that and my screaming arm and head, I realised that we had bigger problems.

It was funny though, because as we began to move, Dad was focused on me, more than our current predicament.

I felt his concerned gaze on me as he shifted his arm to a better position. "John," he asked suddenly, narrowing his brows. "Have you been losing weight?"

I thought about that, 'no, I don't think so', being the planned response, but I was reminded of the fact that I hadn't been very hungry lately, and with the distraction of the multiple rescues we had undertaken, I actually hadn't been eating as much as I usually did. It was something I'd not realised until he had mentioned it. However, I was saved from replying to the puzzling question by his attention being drawn to Gordon.

Reaching the airlock before the rest of us, he had apparently punched in the code to release us to the care of Thunderbird Three, and our ride back to earth, but to my surprise, Gordon blurted, "The locking mechanism's jammed!"

I couldn't see their faces; the world wasn't holding calm enough for that, but I could feel the tense set of the muscles of the two people holding me up, and from my own gut, that it was not a good situation for us to find ourselves in.

There was a sudden hiss of static, and a beep coming from what I knew without looking was the main communications screen.

Despite the vertigo and pain it caused, I still swung around in unison with my father and Virgil to see the caller was not Brains, as I had first assumed, but some guy in an Asian robe, and a bald pate and bushy eyebrows. I glared at him in sudden rage; half on behalf of IR's security, half in terror of who he was and what in hell he wanted.

I listened to him gloat as he told us of how he had taken over our operational systems.  Duh. As if we hadn't noticed that already!

I bit my lip in a monumental effort to not say something stupid; angry as I was that he had tampered with IR, trapped our friends, and attacked my poor baby, he hadn't yet mentioned the kids. Hopefully they weren't captured by this nut-case. I didn't want to antagonise him in any way if I could help it though, just in case.

Scott, it seemed, had no such qualms. It seemed his whole lecture on 'think first, act later' didn't apply to him and his actions in the way he expected the rest of us to behave.

As much as he had basically raised us for nearly a year after Mom had died, he never seemed to realise that to some extent, he had to practice what he preached. But I supposed he had a perfectly good reason; all our lives and our livelihoods were being threatened by this oversized ego of a world-class idiot.

"You'll never get away with it!"

Then, my dad cut in.

"Why the Thunderbirds?" He sounded wary. I honestly didn't blame him. It wasn't every day a person was trapped on a floating hunk of junk in the middle of space, with no apparent way out.

The man whined about how awful we were for not being foolish and doing a search for a body in a dangerous mine with no life-signature to speak of, and then his henchman had the nerve to grin menacingly at us and shut off the link.

With a zinging sound, the screen went dark. The few systems that had been left operational began to power down.

"Scott!" I heard my father's voice bark out. "Status report."

I knew what was coming, even before my brother spoke. "Co2 levels are rising."

And was it just me, or was the temperature going up? I scowled; the moron had turned up the climate control. Contrary to what some people may believe, I didn't especially want to become Roast John.

"Wire the oxygen scrubbers to the emergency battery. See if you can clean the air." Scott nodded at Dad's barked order, and turned away, his shoulders tense beneath his uniform.

I felt Virgil stiffen slightly as I began to waver; my energy levels beginning to drop, and I knew he'd be lowering me to rest against that stupid console again in a minute.

I heard him ask warily, just how long the rewiring of the oxygen scrubbers would give us, and I couldn't help but answer him, despite the fact that I would be voicing the unspeakable.

"About four hours." My voice was quiet; hoarse and weak, but it was heard clearly through the entire room.

From where I was standing, it looked as though it was going to be a very short day.


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: If not for Sylvia and Gerry Anderson, I would not be able to play in this wonderful playground, so no, I do not own the Thunderbirds.

The five of us stared grimly at one another as the gravity of my statement sunk in. It was becoming a very real possibility that barring a major miracle, Thunderbird Five could very well become our tomb.

The situation was ironic, because not forty minutes ago, I had been staring Death in the face, and it was only by the slimmest margin that I had been allowed to escape his grasp. It was with a detached sense of realisation that I could tell that I was beginning to go into delayed shock.

I suppose that I had realised as soon as I had begun to sag in my brother's grip that there was a problem, but in typical Tracy fashion, I had attempted to brush it off, in the face of my father needing every single one of us to be able to function in our quest to get Thunderbird Five back under our control, as slim as the chance might have been. That proved to be my downfall.

After trying, and failing under the steely, blue-and-violet-eyed glares of both my father and Scott, —who had swapped with Virgil in the hope that the engineer would have a better time in figuring out the repairs— to stand up without the aid of anything other than my own two feet and rather dubious balance, it was officially stated that I was out of the running for the repairs to my own ship. It proved too much to ask that my body would let me rise without any more pretty fireworks displays from the optical department.

It was, I am ashamed to say, almost twenty minutes before I was even half-way ready to accept the hands that had offered me an easy way up.

I must admit I would probably have been sitting there a hell of a lot longer had Scott not lost the shreds of his already tenuous patience and enlisted my father's help in hauling me firmly, but gently to my feet. Gripping my arms lest I topple to the ground again, they steered me bodily over to the chair that was basically the only thing on the station that was still intact, save for the bent armrest and the fact that there was a gaping hole in the upholstery from some jagged, airborne bit of some vital console.

I was really quite astonished at how much effort it took to actually stay braced in the dratted thing.

What began as a simple matter of leaning against the back-rest became a fully-fledged battle between me, and the force that was gravity, as it attempted to drag me from the seat and back onto the floor. A white-knuckle grip on the chair in question eventually became a matter of absentminded habit, as I stared somewhat dazedly around the station as my brothers attempted to bring control back into our hands.

An indeterminate amount of time passed, interspersed with Virgil's frequent, rather annoying checks of my vitals. In between these intrusions into my consciousness, I wondered why exactly it felt as though the world was floating in clouds. I was quite sure I was in a space station, though why exactly it felt like a sauna was beyond my ken.

In the moments when my dazed mind surfaced from the fog that engulfed it, I wondered what was occurring down on the island. I hoped with all my heart that my littlest brother and his friends hadn't been caught; but hot-headed Tracy that he was, I could hardly expect Alan to back off from this 'Hood' person without a fight. Unlike Scott earlier, I could only imagine the things that Alan could possibly say to antagonise the guy who held our fate in his hands. He was still so young —wanting to grow up long before he ever really needed to— and that was all of our faults as brothers, just as much as it was Dad's.

What I wouldn't give to have the fourteen-year-old in my grasp, to be able to tell him to treasure his childhood years; to be the voice of reason to my youngest sibling, as I invariably was to the rest of them. As I couldn't have that, I could only wish with my entire soul to have him as far as humanly possible from the trouble that I knew was stirring on the island like the bees in a disturbed hive. With that last, profoundly depressing thought, I sank once again into my contemplation of the meteoric dust that swirled stormily in my mind.

A sudden, explosive impression of sound and movement was by far my clearest impression for what seemed like a long time.

I felt a sickening  grraapp  from somewhere in my midsection, and I cried out in a mixture of pain and shock as I was toppled out of my chair and once again, onto the floor, clocking my head again. Reality suddenly crashed into me with a jolt of terror that had all the force of a freight train. When in the hell did I zone out?

The question terrified me. Was it the head injury? Or maybe it was the pain medication that Virgil had administered… My God, I hoped it was the pain meds that were making me this dopey, or I had something very worrying to say to my family. I shook my head, sparks of light blinking into my field of vision as I fought to stay in focus.

Shifting painfully, the sharp pulse of my head and shoulder strong again, even through the meds and the clearing haze, I heard Scott yell. "The heat exchange has blown!"

Brilliant . I griped.  Baby, you really aren't helping to us get you up and running here. I know you're hurt, but a little bit of cooperation never hurt anybody.

I sighed unhappily. If we got out of this, it was going to take weeks to get Five up and going again. 'If' being the operative word.

I blinked, my brain suddenly reconnecting with my surroundings. Apparently, the clouds weren't completely in my head.

Buddy, smoke generally occurs when machinery malfunctions. I reminded myself pointedly.

I opened and closed my watery eyes. The smokiness was fairly pouring from a ruined console, and I coughed harshly through it, as I saw my fellow prisoners pick themselves off of the ground. I watched Gordon, who seemed to be the only one who had been able to brace himself in time, as he held out a hand and gave Dad a guide in getting to his feet. They then both helped Scott out from where he'd fallen into the generator pit, coughing through words I was too tired to understand.

Squinting mightily in the light from the fluorescent torches that had been mounted on the consoles, I fondly examined my youngest present brother, and grinned as I realised that his hair was beginning to grow out.

A natural redhead; a throwback from our mother's side of the family, Gordon had regretfully made the decision eighteen months ago to shear off and dye the roots of his flaming locks to a shade that almost matched Scott's in darkness, after the huge amount of publicity that his Olympic win, and later hydrofoil accident had garnered. He had said that he was just too recognisable, and that it could compromise IR's anonymity if someone put two and two together.

I was just infinitely amused by the fact that when he managed to grow a sparse bit of stubble, it always ended up an almost poisonous orange colour, as though his jaw was attempting to make up for the lack of fire on the top of his head.

Scott himself was a worry, I thought wryly. Worse than the rest of us combined in the stubbornness stakes, he was currently refusing to let Dad examine the gash above his eyebrow, stating as he wadded his sleeve against it, that he was fine; despite the fact that blood was pouring down the side of his face and that he was clinging something fiercely to the unit at his back in an attempt to keep himself upright.

I gulped as I saw the hue of scarlet against his skin, and hurriedly looked away; apparently my usually iron-hard gag reflex had gone on holiday, as I was just about ready to either faint dead away, or upchuck across the floor at the mere sight of the blood on his face.

Sighing in relief as my poor stomach decided it was going to have a shot at being calm, I hesitantly went to raise myself to a sitting position.

Tucking my good arm beneath my body, I went to shift my hips in readiness to wriggle myself to the wall that I knew was a few feet behind me. As a wave of ripping agony tore through my consciousness from a single focus point, I stopped in horror as the lack of a certain, vital detail suddenly registered.

Quietly panicking, my eyes widening in terror, I scrambled to reassure myself. Digging the nails of thumb and forefinger into the skin of my thigh, I twisted it savagely; the sharp pinch of tearing flesh, despite the heaviness of my gloves, gave me a certain measure of relief that set me to trembling. Then, shuddering with dreaded, hopeful anticipation, I once again attempted to shift the position of my lower body.

Letting out a choked cry, I inevitably drew the attention of the rest of my family.

Virgil, in the process of pulling himself cautiously to his feet, abandoned all care for his own needs as he skidded to a halt beside me and dropped to his knees; all professionalism deserting him as Dad arrived right on his heels.

"What's the matter, John?" His eyes were wide and his voice was cracking with worry as he checked me over.

Despite the mounting horror, and utter ridiculousness of the situation, I somehow managed to curtail my frantic, unbridled terror. He was my little brother, dammit, and I was sure as hell going to try and ease his worry, even at the expense of my own feelings.

My voice came out much colder than I intended, the words tight with the roar of fiery pain in my back and passing through a throat scratchy from the smoke that still lingered in the air. I wanted evidence for my thoughts, in the most concrete way possible.

"Help me sit up…" I croaked. "Please..."

Immediately, my eldest and second-youngest brothers each echoed Dad and Virge's earlier positions, as they pulled me upright from where I was sprawled on the chilled floor. Four sets of widened eyes stared horrified, as I was shifted; my lower limbs dragging bonelessly along the smooth floor. There was no help given from the multitude of muscles and tendons they housed, and I knew then that my worst suspicions were confirmed.

Holy  Shit.


	5. Inherent

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: If not for Sylvia and Gerry Anderson, I would not be able to play in this wonderful playground, so no, I do not own the Thunderbirds.

Whoever said that 'silence is golden' is ridiculously deluded in my mind. The kind of silence that reigned in the half-dozen seconds following my speechless revelation was anything but golden. Earth-shatteringly horrifying? Shocking, and even potentially life-changing; yes. Shiny and new, and the perfect colour of freshly-picked corn? Hell no!

However, the person who said that silence can be freaking loud is right on the mark.

Surprisingly, it was my dad who recovered first. Judging by the white-sheet paleness that was the colour of his face, I fully expected him to keel over at any time, and then we (well my brothers anyway) would be peeling yet another family member from a prone position on the floor.

"John," he looked at me in concern, searching for something in my face that was apparently hard to find.I could read his just fine; terrified uncertainty of our current situation, coupled with wild hope that this would not be one of the final conversations we would have together. "Don't take it at face value. We'll get you checked out at the hospital. It'll be fine… you'll see."

I could tell that he was desperately trying to believe his own words, despite the fact that there was no guarantee that I had only slipped a disk or something, that the paralysis was not a permanent condition.

I needed hardly point out that unless we got the miracle I had mentioned earlier, there was probably no chance of any of us getting to a hospital other than to head to the mortuary. That was being optimistic, assuming that Thunderbird Five was detected by NASA, or one of the other space agencies in the time between our asphyxiation and when we burnt up in the earth's atmosphere. I shuddered at the very idea.

Despite the apparent fact that my entire midsection was now seizing with the pain of clenching muscles, it was obviously too much to ask that even with the added support of two extra bodies holding me up, that gravity couldn't still be winning in our ongoing battle on whether I was up or down.

To my great surprise, I found myself slowly begin to list to one side; my stomach and leg muscles obviously not up to the task of helping to stop my rapid descent.  Hold on, I thought, twisting my head in an attempt to see my right side, looking to see why it appeared my bandaged shoulder would soon be kissing the deck.  I thought Scott was at my back a minute ago!

Clearly, my concussion was affecting me more than I thought; for as soon as I was sure that I was going to be in a lot more pain much sooner, a pair of arms suddenly pulled me to the other side, until I was resting against what I assumed was someone's chest. Craning my neck, somewhat dazed from the rapid change in perspective, I realised that it was Gordon.

Suddenly very worried about the fact that Scott was no longer at my back, I looked around briefly, until my eyes fell on Virgil and Dad, who were currently hovering over a slumped form, much like they had been doing to me mere minutes ago.

"Scott!" I croaked in alarm, attempting, despite the non-responsiveness of my limbs, and Gordon's restraining hands on my upper body, to get to my eldest brother; who at merely a foot away, seemed infinitely distant to my grasping hands. "What's wrong with him!" I asked, simultaneously panicked and peeved that I couldn't see, nor reach out to him.

"I'm fine." The grunted response; disembodied, but no less insistent and grumpy, was enough to send a wave of relief through my entire being.

I choked back a laugh as I heard Virgil's response, and watched him shift slightly, our father sitting on the opposite side of Scott's sprawled form.

"Uh-huh." I heard him snort. "Try telling me that again."

Whatever Virgil did next obviously didn't sit well with my eldest brother, as there was a groaning from their little corner, and a wet, splattering noise that left nothing in doubt as to what had happened.

I heard Gordon snigger over my head as, clearly seeing more than I could, he found something infinitely amusing about the fact that our eldest brother had upchucked across the station floor, proved by the nauseating smell that reached my nostrils a couple of seconds later.

I shared his hilarity; in my case amused because I too had hit my head rather hard, and wasn't currently tossing my cookies if I moved too rapidly. Virgil had obviously made him move forward too fast to make a point; when you bash you head, it really ain't the brightest idea to claim that you're fine when you quite clearly aren't.

It lasted a few seconds, at least until the smell reached my stomach.

The grin I had from my father's comment of 'that's why you listen to the medic', slid rapidly off of my face, and I swore I felt myself go green. I realised that I had a bad case of Mimic the Older Brother', when I found myself abruptly turned to the left, heaving dryly across my second-youngest brother's knees.

I couldn't see Gordon's face, owing to the angle I was currently at, but I could hear the mingled disgust and restrained amusement at my predicament, as I brought up nothing but a foul-tasting mouthful of spit for my troubles.

"Well," he said. "I'm already filthy, a bit of vomit probably ain't gonna hurt."

I just groaned at him in response.

After a minute, my stomach ceased its frantic somersaulting, and I shakily braced myself against Gordon as he helped me back to lean against the wall.

Then, when he was assured that I was still reasonably coherent and steady in my placement, I watched as he moved across to our father to help bully Scott into moving the short distance to where I was awkwardly reclined; legs dangling uselessly in front of me. Virgil followed, placing the self-same penlight he had used on me back into his pocket before stopping in front of Scott, standing over him with arms crossed tight across his chest.

Looking our brother in the eye, he glared at him pointedly. "You." He said firmly. "Will stay put."

Never let it be said that Scott Tracy disobeys orders, or questions them.  I thought wryly to myself.  Yeah, right.

I glanced at Dad and Gordon. Both wore identical looks of amusement, almost covering the looks of exhaustion and apprehension that I knew that we all had in our eyes. Virgil could be just like Scott, if he so chose.

The guy in question, apparently discovering that he was incapable of rising without help —though I could tell that he clearly wanted to— opened his mouth in preparation to spit out what was probably a very well thought-through argument. He was cut off even before he had managed to even take a breath.

"No!" Virgil practically snarled the word. "I don't want you moving anywhere. I do not care if you  think you are able to help; it ain't happening. You have a concussion Scott! You will stay with John and keep an eye on him, until I tell you to move." He raised an eyebrow. "Got it?"

I was rather annoyed that Virgil had used me as the main excuse to get Stubborn-Ass to stay put, but a part of me couldn't help but admire my brother's strategy. What better way to ensure that Scott stayed with his backside glued to the floor, than give him a brother to mother-hen to death?

Urgh . I groaned good-naturedly to myself. And I couldn't even run away if I tried.

That thought brought me to a screeching halt. Oh, yes. That.

I bit my lip. The bloody inside of it gave me the tiniest distraction in taking my mind off of the fact that, yes, I could feel my legs, but I still couldn't move them. It was not for lack of trying though. Damn head injury. I seemed to be forgetting important facts about my condition, and that was continually peeving the shit out of me.

Scott and I sat in silence; he was obviously still far too nauseous to even think about moving or talking. I just simply sat and watched the three remaining able-bodied people attempt to finish what Scott had begun.

##

I drifted in and out of awareness for a while, Scott clearly wasn't much better, until I heard the chirp of the communications screen again. Lifting my head blearily, I half-expected it to be Idiot Number One back to recommence his gloating.

However, Gordon's voice stated the obvious; like the rest of us couldn't recognise that face! Though it was riddled with fuzziness, and blurry from an obviously terrible connection, we saw it just about every day… I grinned in relief.

"It's Alan!"


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: If not for Sylvia and Gerry Anderson, I would not be able to play in this wonderful playground, so no, I do not own the Thunderbirds.

I grinned at the image of Alan on the screen. His face was dirty, his hair full of twigs and leaves, and he looked like he'd taken a bath in his clothes, but it was my youngest kid brother no question; staring in a kind of wide-eyed amazement at the hand-held screen he was holding up to his face.

Dad wasted no time. Just about yelling, though the volume in his voice was more due to relief than anger, his face was strained and pale as far as I could see, only being able to see a very small part of his profile from my current vantage point. "Where are you? Are you safe?"

"I'm at the satellite relay station with Fermat and Tin-Tin!"

A wave of relief washed over me. The kids were alright… for the moment.

My little brother was still rambling away to Dad, apparently checking over his shoulder to reference with someone. My guess was that Fermat was the one who had made contact with the station. That kid was honestly amazing, but with a man like Brains for a father, it was really no surprise that the twelve-year old was as intelligent and bright as he was.

Through the ringing in my ears, I caught something along the lines of 'return control' and 'Thunderbird Five' and I felt a spark of hope ignite in the previously damp, dark pit in my chest. Maybe our chances weren't as bleak as I thought!

But would it work?

Beside me, I felt Scott shift slightly, and I realised that he was steeling himself to move. After a moment of listening to him gasp and wobble he finally gained his feet, and I realised with a start that he was actually leaving me.

Reaching with my left arm across my body, I attempted to snag his ankle, despite the fact that it would probably send him crashing to the ground. In my annoyance, I didn't really care. Hadn't Virgil just ordered him not to move? Even I knew in my confusion that team medic trumped the decisions of field commander any day!

Remembering my own predicament, I realised that if I were to shift much farther I'd probably end up staring at the station from across the floor, and I wouldn't be able to see the comm. screen at all, let alone anything about the current situation. I stopped shuffling immediately as the thought entered my mind. I really didn't want to send myself sprawling again.

I watched as Scott staggered his way over to the desk, grabbing heavily to anything that he found along his way to enable him keep his questionable balance. As he reached the rest of them, Virgil automatically steadied Scott; supporting him enough to stay upright, but also apparently enough that Alan didn't notice that anything was wrong. I felt a flash of jealousy, but it was immediately quashed by the fact that panicked shouting was occurring between Dad and Alan, whose image seemed to be fading in a wave of fuzziness.

"Dad! Is John okay?" the garbled question filled my heart with mingled panic and warmth. On the one hand, I was glad that someone had remembered that I was hurt, but I also didn't want Alan to know that I was so injured that I couldn't even stand up on my own!

The stuttering of the frail connection sent any other thought about my brother's knowledge of my physical state out of my mind, as Alan realised that the signal was probably being tracked.

"He'll be okay." Dad told him hurriedly, as Alan simultaneously assured him that he'd 'fix everything'. Was I even hearing right at the moment? I wasn't sure. Did he really say what I thought he had?

The ever more confusing exchange didn't allow much leeway for the older man to dispute the kid's apparent conclusion of the matter. "No…. Alan…It's too dangerous!"

Not only that,  I thought.  but Alan can barely fix his own messes, let alone those of someone else…

I found that I was somewhat glad that my dad hadn't had time to answer Alan's inevitable questions on my condition.

The kid had just as much of an interest in the medical sciences as Virgil had had at his age, if not more. He'd be able to see just by the expressions on our faces that something ghastly was wrong, even though he knew that we were in some pretty deep trouble. It was just fortunate that he hadn't had the time to realise that I wasn't standing at the screen with the rest of our family. I was out of eyeshot, after all.

Any further conversation was rendered useless as the transmission was abruptly cut off. There was a hiss of the electrical wiring overhead as it sparked, and then the screen once again was dark.

Shit.

The bastard leader and his minions had obviously jammed the connection, and if they had done that, they had most definitely been able to track the kids' position at Satellite Hill. They were most likely caught already, especially if the Hood had searched the complex and found the quad-bikes.

I couldn't help but begin to feel rather pissed off at the entire situation. My littlest brother could be hurt and scared, and I couldn't stand up; even with the help of others, let alone comfort Alan from up on a station that had long ago become a death-trap! Scott had otherwise abandoned me, while he joined the rest of them in frantically trying to reconnect the transmission.

God, I was dizzy.

"Idiots." I muttered beneath my breath. Even if they had a speck of luck in being able to break through the blocks that that Hood guy had put on command and control, there would undoubtedly be no-one to pick it up. It seemed to me that it wasn't only the guys with the head injuries that were being illogical.

With a burst of clarity, it occurred to me that it was probably the steady rising of the carbon dioxide in the air that was affecting my father and brothers' decision-making abilities.

Making up my mind, I shifted slightly, intending to kind of tip myself to my left side and claw myself to where the others were. I was  not  going to spend my last couple hours in isolation thank-you very much, screwed head, back and shoulder be damned!

The decision didn't seem to be mine to make however, as the short time I had been sitting there seemed to have stiffened every single muscle that I needed in order to move. In place of actually getting anywhere with my newfound determination, I merely ended up letting out a kind of choked whimpering noise as the pain in my spine peaked.

Virgil —who had finally noticed that Scott was really in danger of falling flat on his face— had planted him in the chair that I had been occupying a short while ago, before hearing the pitiful sound that had escaped past my lips without my permission.

Closing my eyes as I chomped on my poor, mangled bottom lip in a mix of agony and frustration, I found it easier to deal with the pain by slamming my head into the wall behind me a few times. Better to give me something else to focus on other than the aftermath of my failed attempt at movement.

Crying out as my body smugly informed me that,  yes, I can increase your suffering if you want, buddy , I felt someone move me sideways to lie flat on my back in a position that relaxed my seizing muscles.

I heard Virgil mutter something about stupid, idiotic  arrogant elder brothers, and then there was a loud impact of a palm hitting skin. Thinking that my brother was trying to measure the responsiveness of my legs and feet, I lurched upwards slightly, panicking that I couldn't feel anything he was doing to me.

My eyes snapping open, I nearly wept with relief when I realised that what I'd heard was Virgil's palm, impacting with his own forehead. I heard him curse explicitly, before calling something over to Gordon.

Suddenly, or so it seemed to me and my befuddled thoughts, the world seemed to be nothing more than a multi-coloured blur. I felt my legs and torso being lashed to a hard, rigid object and a flat pillow being slipped beneath my head, padded with what appeared to be the blanket out of the storage locker off the side of the control room.

Oh. I thought, as the pretty lights suddenly vanished, leaving me staring at the ceiling with a scattered sense of vertigo from the abrupt changeover. I'm on a backboard .

I was kind of peeved at that, when I realised just how long it had taken them to remember the fact that I'd injured my back enough that I couldn't effing move! Not that I'd actually thought of that myself, but I didn't want to admit it, even in the privacy of my own mind.

Yep... That was me; stuck up here, and forgotten until the very last.

Wait.  My heart thumped uncomfortably as my brain suddenly rebutted my last thought. Why in the hell would my family be up here, dying with me, if I was really the last thing that was thought of? I knew then that the decrease of the oxygen in the station was beginning to get to me as well.

If we were going to somehow survive, I knew that Alan and the others had better get their asses into gear and put us back in control before we fell into a never-ending sleep.

Just then, I felt myself rise ungainly into the air as there was a _whirr_ and then a rather alarming clunk, and I knew instantly that the gravity generator had given up its will to survive.

Great. I thought sarcastically. Another thing to worry about; whether I'd end up braining one of my family members as I drifted around the station on a giant metal surfboard.

I grinned somewhat bemusedly at the mental picture  that  presented.

It seemed as though someone had read my mind, as I found myself achieving a relatively stationary position, and I saw Gordon industriously tying the ends of a couple of lengths of rope from one of the emergency packs between me, and one of the handholds on the wall. They were usually used for climbing up to the hatch for repairs to the antenna plate on the roof of the station, but I had to admit that this use suited it rather well. I didn't know what the other end of my perch was fastened to, but I grinned like a dolt as I realised that he had created a kind of strange metal hammock for me to recline in.

Ha! See!  I told my oxygen-deprived brain as my brother winked at me, his dirty face worn with tiredness and worry.  You're definitely loved.


	7. Clearly Stormy

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: If not for Sylvia and Gerry Anderson, I would not be able to play in this wonderful playground, so no, I do not own the Thunderbirds.

I couldn't be sure of the exact point I zoned out, but the last thing I could clearly remember was my father; holding up a mask to one of the few oxygen tanks we had in our possession, and his tired voice cajoling me to stay awake. But how in the heck do you stay awake when there's basically no oxygen to assist you in being aware in the first place?

Mostly, what I recalled after that were impressions more than thoughts and feelings. I remembered watching rather bemusedly as I saw Virgil drift sleepily past my head; his eyes closed and limbs splayed around him, then Gordon as he lurched somewhat violently into my makeshift cot, sending me swaying from side to side.

I was sure that I was supposed to be feeling something as I was shaken about; annoyance or pain, maybe? I felt myself struggling to comprehend the reason  why I could see my family floating about me. I knew somehow, from somewhere in my muddled brain, that humans really weren't meant to fly, that's why they had built rocket ships, after all...

I giggled then, as my brain realised that with the slight exclusion of my brother Gordon, — who I was sure was at least three-quarters fish— it seemed that the majority of my family were born with wings rather than feet.

That particular thought amused me for what seemed like an exhaustingly long time. The tiny part of my mind that seemed to be reasonably coherent whispered that that there was something seriously wrong; I was really not known for my sense of humour, nor a tendency to randomly start  giggling . Honestly; that was something I would expect from thirteen-year-old Tin-Tin, as sensible as she was, rather than John Stick-in-the-Mud Tracy.

"Eurrgh…" It was concerned but gentle, the voice that brought me back to awareness. Belatedly realising that the 'John' the voice was calling was actually me, I blearily opened my eyes, a grunt escaping from my mouth.

Scott came into focus; his face pale, tired and dirty. Aside from a large, greying piece of gauze covering the gash along the hairline near his temple, and the way he was gritting his jaw, my elder brother seemed remarkably well, and steady on his feet for someone I quite clearly remembered almost falling over from nausea and dizziness not long ago.

Speaking of nausea… I became unpleasantly aware that my own stomach seemed rather unhappy with the return of my awareness, and was churning like when I had gone on the whirligig that time at the Bentley county fair when I was twelve, not to mention the fact that I felt chilled, shivery and sticky with sweat.

Feeling as though I was on a real hammock, as opposed to a rigid metal board, I barely had time to croak something that sounded barely human, before I was trying not to choke on bile and stomach acid as it spewed past my lips. Cautious hands rolled me gently to my left; and I realised that I had been untied from where I had been lying flat on my back. I felt someone rubbing my shoulder blades as I lay there heaving, trying to regain control of my lurching gut.

My head was pounding as the world swung up and down, my eyes tearing up with the agony that reverberated through every part of my body. I gave a weak grin to my eldest and second brothers as I clenched my jaw in misery, somewhat uncaring of exactly when Virgil had gained the ability to teleport.

Clearing my throat, despite the fact that the taste of bile appeared to have seared a burning line up my oesophagus, I gagged slightly at the disgusting taste of vomit that lingered in my mouth. Thanking whoever it was that had blessed my immediate younger brother with the power of mind-reading, I sipped gratefully at the water from the ration-pack that Virgil held to my lips, sighing lightly in relief as both the sour taste and burning sensation dissipated somewhat.

"Are we sure that it's just a head injury?" I asked him hoarsely, actually worried about this particular fact. "I feel like I've got flu or something…"

I wearily closed my eyes against the sudden all-over aching of my limbs; not wanting to see the looks that I knew misters Medic and Smother-Hen were giving each other. Yes, I felt that awful that I was actually admitting to being ill and in pain in my desperation for relief from my never-ending state of all-out agony.

It's true though. I thought as I felt someone's fingers card through my filthy hair, gentle and soothing in the face of my overall feeling of ill-health. I had only felt this awful once before in my life, and even then, it wasn't so abrupt in its commencement. I had been feeling off for weeks before I had become so sick.

I glanced up around the station, my attention diverted by the flickering lights of the sparking consoles, much like Gordon at five-years-old, when fish were suddenly dropped into the conversation, and I realised that there was more to the buzzing sound in my head that first met the eye.

Apparently, while I had been out cold the station's power had been returned, and I felt endlessly stupid for not noticing before that my brothers were actually kneeling on the floor beside my face, and not floating freely through the air.

I let out a weak grin at the tenacity of my youngest brother and my extended family, realising that they had come through for us. That was even as I noticed that my headache was back with a vengeance. So much worse than before, as it seemed that I could barely move, due to fear of vomiting again.

I blinked, trying to zone in on what Virgil was saying, as he re-tied the straps that held me firmly against the backboard. I heard him mention something about London, and that the three kids and Lady Penelope had taken Thunderbird One.

I sniggered at that, despite the utter agony it sent ripping through my skull. As the only one of the aforementioned four who even remotely knew how to fly the reconnaissance plane, Alan had better run if he had even thought about scratching Scotty's 'bird; our brother would surely find his hide flayed if he did.

I suddenly found myself rising into the air again, though the sensation was markedly different to the last, due to the actual presence of good ol' gravity. I felt my cheeks burn with embarrassment as I was carried by Gordon and Virgil through the docking tunnel, and we came to a halt next to the airlock of Thunderbird Three. I shifted rather ineffectively as I tried to adjust my discomfort. Straining against the stiff agony of my spine, I suddenly yelped slightly; feeling my back crack painfully as my foolish efforts gave off, and I suddenly noticed something that made me gasp out loud.

"Virgil!" I cried. "My feet!"

I couldn't see them myself, of course, but really? Who doesn't know when they're moving their own legs?

I grinned maniacally as I heard exuberant yells of joy, as they all hovered over my lower limbs. I bit back a chuckle as I realised how absurd it was that four grown men were so fascinated with ten itsy pieces of nail and skin attached to an even bigger set of appendages, but it was all worth it as Virgil made me wiggle them following the removal of my boots and socks.

I grinned in sheer joy at my Dad as he returned to his place at my head, smiling broadly at me in a mixture of relief and love. I had never before realised exactly how much I loved my feet than I did at that very moment.

As they lay me down on the floor outside the airlock of Three, all of us still grinning somewhat idiotically at the good news, I realised something that left the lot of us in a right state of quandary. Well, me the most anyway.

We had literally nowhere for a five foot eleven guy to be laid out flat on the ground, nor was there anything to tie a cot down on in the first place.

As much as the orange-hued craft was used for space rescues every now and then, there was no conceivable way that I would be tethered securely enough to not exacerbate my injuries. I scowled as the lot of them immediately started bickering over how we were going to overcome this latest obstacle.

After almost five minutes of listening to their raised voices reverberate painfully through my aching head, as they ran through various scenarios (none of which included me moving even an inch from my current position), I raised my voice to be heard. I was finding that my usually endless patience was fraying rather rapidly, probably as a result of the head injury.

"Oh, for the love of all that's holy!" I cried. "Just let me up already!"

They turned to stare at me; a mix of incredulous, pitying and impatient expressions varying from one face to another, and I had to hide a grin at their absurdity.

Raising an eyebrow, I said very slowly and firmly, "Just untie me, would you, and then I can sit in one of the jump-seats."

Cutting off Scott as he went to protest, I continued; raising my voice sharply to override any further objections, as much as it made my brain protest at the sound. "I don't care if you tie me down so I can't move; or flatten the damn thing entirely; you can put me back on the board afterwards…"

I kept going, ignoring the dumbstruck looks I was receiving. "I've been bumped around enough already: a little more ain't gonna hurt… Just get us the hell outta here!

Dad frowned, part in suppressed amusement, partly in mingled concern for me, and disapproval over my language, but nodded nevertheless, though I knew that he clearly thought that the idea was daft. I had just regained movement in my legs, and there was no guarantee that the jouncing I would receive as we re-entered the atmosphere wouldn't return them to their previous state of uselessness. But, I told myself; it was the only way we would be able to get me back to earth, and by God, I would pilot the damn ship myself, one handed and no-legged if it meant I would get there sooner.

I watched my brothers impatiently for a second, and when it appeared that none of them were going to move within the next split-second time-frame, began to swipe my left hand blindly for the ties of the rope that bound me flat to the board. I smirked slightly, as the idea that I would try and rise myself jolted my siblings into action. Virgil and Scott untied the restraining ropes over my torso and legs, and Gordon assisted me in slowly moving into an upright position.

Dad winked at me as I looked up at him, and I knew that he knew exactly what my strategy was from the very beginning. I had known that I couldn't move myself, but if the action got my block-headed brothers to get a bomb beneath their backsides, I couldn't really see the problem. I could sense my father's concern though, seeing his brow tighten and crease in worry as I winced with the movement of my stretching muscles.

"I'm as fine as I'm gonna be guys." I said wearily, after gripping white-knuckled to Gordon's shoulder as I was carried by my ginger and chestnut-haired brothers over to the seat nearest the airlock, my voice cracking slightly with pain as I was settled into it.

As Scott lowered the safety harness, hovering unnecessarily over the straps across my midsection, I saw him waver for a moment, and I recalled his own injury. Grinning menacingly to myself, as I contemplated what I was about to do, I spoke with the intention of getting the attention off of me.

"Hey Scotty," I asked in a measure of genuine concern and another of slightly plotting vindictiveness. "Are you okay? You look a little pale there."

As predicted, Virgil's gaze flicked immediately to our eldest brother, and I saw Gordon shoot me a sort of approving grin, mixed as it was with concern for both me and the Stubborn-Butt. We both knew that Scott would use any of us as an excuse to wave away his own difficulties, so why not return the favour?

As Virgil practically dragged Scott over to another seat, I caught Dad's eye with a smile as he settled into the co-pilot's seat down the front.

He obviously planned to allow one of the younger guys to fly us home. He knew all of our tricks, being the guy who had raised us and all; and he had obviously reckoned that in this instance, we were big enough and ugly enough to settle our arguments amongst ourselves.

Once finished ignoring Scott, and his insistence that he was plenty fine to fly Thunderbird Three back to earth, Virgil tried and failed to dislodge Gordon from his already-claimed position as main pilot, parking himself resignedly in the middle seat.

Then he must have realised, judging by the sudden brightening of his expression, that his current position ensured that he could keep an eye on us invalids, and also easily converse with the able-bodied people down the front.

There was a rumble of engines, and Gordon's voice announcing the completion of pre-launch procedures, and suddenly, I was blinking profusely as white lights popped in my eyes with the rapid onset of G-force dizziness. I gulped heavily as my gut lurched again, panting shakily as we levelled out. I sneaked a peek over at Scott, who like me, was obviously feeling a little green around the gills.

"Okay over there, Scotty?" I grimaced rather than grinned as I had planned, as a savage pulse of pain rammed into my body all of a sudden.

Whoa.  I thought woozily as my brain thought fit to plunge me into dizzy-land again. Eyelids fluttering as I tried to both clear my head of cobwebs, and blink sweat from my forehead out of my eyes, I realised that I hadn't exactly heard my brother's answer.

"Uh…" I whispered, sure he must have replied. "Scott… You 'kay?"

"Johnny," the voice that replied really didn't sound like my brother. "Do you mind shutting up?" I winced at the hissing sound my brother let out as it echoed in the passenger hold. "My head feels like the Mole is drilling into it, and I feel like I'm gonna puke… Does that answer your question?"

I had to chuckle at the absurdity of that statement. He expected me to can it, but probably also wanted an answer to his own enquiry. I replied nonetheless, even if it was only to peeve him off a little.

"Sure." And I couldn't help but add softly and slightly self-accusatorily, because what I asked was in hindsight a rather stupid query considering the condition of my own head. "That's exactly how I feel, Bro. That's exactly how I feel."


	8. If Only

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: If not for Sylvia and Gerry Anderson, I would not be able to play in this wonderful playground, so no, I do not own the Thunderbirds.

The hour-long ride back to earth was possibly one of the most painful things I have ever experienced.

The combined effects of a churning stomach, throbbing head and the utter agony of a bruised and possibly shattered spine did not do anything at all to soothe my terrible mood, and I found myself heartily wishing that I could again go blank to the world around me.

Despite the fact that the effects of my concussion seemed to be receding slightly; the dizziness and overall fogginess of my thoughts at least, it rather seemed that in defiance, my nausea had somehow increased exponentially. I hadn't even realised that it was possible.

Although we had long since levelled out from our launch from the docking station of Thunderbird Five, I found that I had to give myself a private pep talk on how to not pass out from pain and queasiness.

I'd closed my eyes in an attempt to keep my mind from spinning out on me again, but I must have dozed off as a result of the pain and overall exhaustion I was feeling, because the next thing I knew, Virgil's face was floating in front of my bleary eyes, and there was no sign of any of the others that I could see.

Like anyone who had just woken up, I was understandably confused. "We 'ere already?" I slurred, attempting, despite the dense fog in my brain, to understand exactly where 'here' was.

Virgil looked at me worriedly, hand braced on my shoulder as he bent in front of me. Apparently not seeing anything of concern, he raised the stupid penlight he had been frequently flashing at my face up in readiness to repeat the process. "Yes, John. Just one last check, and then we'll get you ready to hand over to the paramedics."

Since my mind seemed finally ready to cooperate and actually allow me to function in the logical thoughts department, I obligingly followed the yellow light as it danced in front of my eyes. "Hey, Virge." I ventured, as my brother placed the torch back in his pocket. "Where's Dad and the others? Have they found Penny and the kids yet?" I knew that as soon as we'd landed, Dad, and most likely Scott would have torn over to Thunderbird One and tied the three teenagers down to prevent them from going anywhere else that even vaguely represented danger.

"Not exactly." Virgil sighed. "The Hood used The Mole to drill beneath the river bed. One of the support pylons from the Thames collapsed and it took one of the monorail cars with it, remember?" I didn't, but that was irrelevant. I must have dozed off again. I had a vague recollection of running and pain, and then nothing. I wasn't worried. Not like I was about other things.

My mouth opened in silent shock, but Virgil interrupted me before I could ask the obvious question.

"We're lucky that the kids got here when they did. Alan took 'Four down and Tin-Tin managed to put the winch on the car when Fermat couldn't get a lock with the clamps. There were only a couple of broken bones from the people inside, thank God. They pulled her to the surface just as we landed. Dad, Gordy and Scott went tearing out there like nothing else." I could imagine. "They've been closing down the accident scene; they won't be much longer, I'm sure." He paused, smiling. "I'm so proud of the Sprout, he's done us well today…"

I nodded only slightly, as I considered the immense wave of pride I felt for my littlest brother; wary of descending into haziness and unbearable agony again.

As my eyes travelled over the interior of 'Three, I groaned at seeing the item that my brother had apparently commandeered from the medical personnel that were undoubtedly on the scene. "I guess it's an ambulance trip for me now huh?" I joked lightly, pleased when I saw Virgil's grin in response.

"So…" I asked, when it appeared that we were going to be sat there a while. "I'm assuming that you guys are gonna want to come to the hospital with me. How're you gonna manage with the secrecy act and all? I'm guessing there's already a story as to how I got my injuries?"

"Got that right in one, John." My brother smiled appreciatively. "So the tale goes like this. We get a rescue call from you in your private lab, after your power has blown and everything, and while we're away, some lunatic comes and steals one of our ships. Figuring we'll drop you off in London while we're here, we've joined our base operatives in order to retrieve our other ship as well."

Looking at the questioning expression I wore, Virgil chuckled. "The others have their helmets on, so they'll most likely be joining you later. Penny will probably stay with you until Dad can come back as Jeff Tracy rather than International Rescue's Commander."

He saw the downcast look on my face and, demonstrating his new mind-reading capabilities, said. "I'll be there for sure. Nobody's seen my face either, so you'll be stuck with the lot of us." I smiled dazedly, exhaustion sweeping through me all of a sudden, despite the little snooze I'd apparently just had.

I thought that there was still something missing, but in my rapidly fuzzing mind, there wasn't really much I could do to work it out. Feeling the encroaching darkness descend on me once again, it was with great relief that I let it drag me down. I knew that it was fine, as Virgil hadn't yet said anything to the contrary about me remaining awake for any particular reason. Anyway, in comparison to what my body was feeling right now, oblivion honestly looked like a much better place to be at the moment.

##

I knew without opening my eyes that I was in a hospital. There's just something that just makes them instantly recognisable, whether you are actually in control of your full capabilities or not.

Initially, there are the sounds; the beeping of monitors, the distant echoes of feet in corridors, the whispering of visitors, and then comes the specific sort of smell; a kind of disgusting mix of cheap, strong disinfectant, and the overwhelmingly un-masked scent of illness, though deeply altered to appear non-existent.

However, that was the one sensation that I didn't experience when I woke. Scent. That worried me inordinately, at least until I opened my eyes, and registered the oxygen mask, coming to the realisation that there was cool air streaming into my nose and trachea. Another thing I didn't register until I opened my eyes (obviously)—squinting against the cool white lights above my head— was the sight across from me.

Scott was in a bed that was assumedly the twin of the one that I was lying on. His face was pale, tired, and probably was made infinitely worse by the large patch of padded gauze that covered the side of his forehead.

As much as I registered the presence of my father and younger brothers scattered on the many couches and chairs throughout the room, distracted from their hushed conversations by my shout, it was only my eldest sibling's state of apparent unconsciousness that penetrated my mind completely.

It looked as though moving was not the best idea for someone in my condition. My half-yelp of "Scott!", muffled as it was by the mask, was quickly smothered by both my Dad and Virgil jumping up abruptly to lean over me, and the fact that an absolute agony of a coughing fit ripped through my lungs at the half-articulated sound.

"John… John!" I looked up at my dad through eyes streaming from pain and the panic fluttering in my chest about why Scott was laid out across from me, a tube trailing from an IV bag above his head. "He's okay; he's just asleep because of the pain meds."

As I relaxed a little, he continued, his fingers tracing soothing circles along the back of my left hand. "He's been admitted only for observation. The knock to his head has completely wiped him out. We've only been here for forty-five minutes but I swear he's woken up asking for you at least five times."

Now that my personal crisis was over, I found that I had the time to adequately assess the situation; the first point of which was my own physical condition.

I noticed, with a kind of amused grimness, that I once again, couldn't feel my arm. The fact that it was still bound across my chest indicated that it was still there, but it was still an immensely strange feeling to feel as though it weren't actually attached. Next was my head, which I noticed was the clearest it had been since the first explosion, and actually didn't really hurt as much. That I registered with heavy relief. I was assuming that I had already been fed painkillers; they were the only thing that would have deadened the agony I had been in the last couple hours.

The thing that caught my attention, however, was the fact that there was a hard, rigid brace wrapped around my lower back and chest; only leaving movement for breaths of a limited capacity. It was no wonder it had been so difficult to catch my breath a couple seconds ago. Really, the only thing that hadn't seemed to be changed was my overly-hot body, and the ill feeling that was still swimming determinedly in my stomach and beneath my ribs.

The idea that my back was braced, even after my entrance into a hospital, very nearly sent me into hysterics, and really, could you have blamed me after everything I'd been hit with, both literally and figuratively? If it weren't for Virgil and Dad, calming me down as they did, I didn't know what I might have done. I looked immediately to Virgil; the one I trusted the most in medical situations, in the hope that he might have been able to give meaning to the object that was causing me so much angst.

"John. Dad just said you've only been here forty-five minutes. You've only just come back from MRI and X-Ray about twenty minutes ago. We've got to give them some time to come back with your results."

I grinned as Gordon added his two cents worth; stepping up behind Dad to quip, "As much as we want them to, they just can't teleport yet."

The sense of once more having a modicum of control over the situation was deepened as Virgil retreated a bit to let Alan step up to me. I beamed at him more brightly than Mom's star, as he hesitated slightly before moving forward eagerly as I gestured with my good arm for him to move to my side.

"Al." I breathed, shifting the mask off of my mouth, despite Virgil's protests, to ensure that my younger brother could understand every word I spoke. "For someone who can be so daft sometimes you have no idea how proud I am of you, Kid."

The tense look that was set on Alan's face melted, to be replaced by a smile that I felt made the room glow so much brighter. I coughed slightly, and I saw with regret as his face twitched slightly. "'M'ok." I said, my voice becoming a little dry. "It's probably just the smoke…?"

My answer-turned-question was answered by a small nod of Virgil's head. I held my arm out for Alan, and he practically launched himself into my one-armed embrace. I held him tight. Though I really wasn't usually one for hugs, Alan was, and I knew that the contact would do wonders for easing the kid's mind.

The moment was shattered however, as a person in a white lab-coat entered the room; a large envelope held against his chest. "Ah. Mr Tracy! Nice to see you awake. I'm assuming your family has filled you in?" Guessing that the Mr Tracy in this instance was me, I nodded my head, hurriedly placing the mask back over my nose and mouth.

"I'm Doctor Abdul." He introduced himself, though I could see from the recognition in the eyes of my Dad and siblings that he was only doing it for my benefit. He was relatively young; maybe two or three years older than Scott, I guessed, as he pulled a data-pad out of his pocket to read something. I sensed rather than saw Gordon dart over to gently coax our eldest brother awake; there would be no way in hell that he would want to miss this…

The tension in the room was so thick that if I had had a knife, I could have sliced right through it. Scott edged his way over to my bed with Gordon's help, before he sat heavily in Virgil's vacated chair, smiling at me as reassuringly as he could.

"Would you prefer I tell you the results in confidence?" Dr. Abdul asked, brown hair flopping into his eyes.

"No." I shook my head, just imagining what any one of them would say to that statement.

"Well." The doctor paused a bit, and I braced myself for what was about to come out of his mouth. "I've got some good news, and I've got some bad news…."


	9. The Good, The Bad,

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If not for Sylvia and Gerry Anderson, I would not be able to play in this wonderful playground, so no, I do not own the Thunderbirds.

Good news… Bad news.

I really hate that phrase. Too clichéd, and it leaves entirely too much time for the person it has been said to to fabricate various, horrific possibilities for the bad news. It also leaves room for that person to wonder what exactly the good news is going to be, and how exactly it is going to be overshadowed.

"This is my colleague, Doctor Thomas…" Dr Abdul indicated a red-haired woman who I hadn't noticed, as she sidled into the room, carrying a data pad of her own. "She's the head of neurology; and was the one to oversee your MRI scans."

Dr Abdul took a deep breath before beginning; once again consulting the damn notes for what appeared to be the ten-thousandth time, and I'd had thought that by now, the guy must have known what he was supposed to be saying. I could tell that Scott, and indeed the rest of my family were getting antsy, and I very much was as well. As the one that the bad news ultimately concerned, I was seriously contemplating just grabbing the data pad right out of the doc's hands and reading the damned thing myself.

I sighed in relief as the guy actually began to speak.

"Well, Mr Tracy-"

"John." I interrupted. I'd rather the guy actually have some kind of familiarity, and being able to distinguish myself from my father and brothers even slightly was an advantage. It gave me the illusion that Dr Abdul might actually care about my condition.

"John. Would you like to begin with the good news or the bad news?" I just stared at him, rather incredulous at the idea of choosing the best or worst aspects to hear about.

"Uh… The good news, I suppose." I scowled openly at him. Clearly he had no concept of telling something to a person. Was he even legally a doctor? He seemed rather unsure of himself.

"Well. What I'll do is begin with your injuries from least to most severe…" He tapped a few times on his pad. "We'll keep you on the oxygen for a couple more hours to clear your lungs of any toxins that might build up. You may have some breathing difficulties as well as a bit of hoarseness, but don't worry too much about that… The drip in your arm is just replenishing the fluids from the slight dehydration you're suffering from, as well as an analgesic to help a little with the pain."

I nodded tightly; not even bothering to look. I wasn't the greatest fan of needles and tubes.

"The dislocation of your right shoulder was correctly positioned at the time of the realignment, and there will be no need for corrective surgery of any kind to repair any tissue or skeletal damage. There is a small hairline fracture at the juncture of your clavicle and shoulder, but a couple weeks immobilised in a support sling will leave no lasting effects." He gestured to Dr Thomas, who stepped forward confidently; not needing the support of the data-pad half as much as her colleague.

"Despite the right bump you've sustained on the occipital bone," She gestured to the area she meant on her own head; towards the lower back part of the skull. "…there doesn't seem to be any indication of bleeding within the cranium, nor any sign of damage other than the contusion itself. You will most likely experience headaches for most of the next week, but they can be controlled with Tylenol, as can the pain you may experience from your shoulder, though I can prescribe something stronger if need be." She paused, looking at me carefully. "Are you with us so far, John?"

I nodded, just wishing that they'd both just hurry up and get to the part I was most apprehensive of hearing. It must be bad if they were addressing all of the other stuff first.

Dr Abdul took over again, this time ignoring his technology. "You have extensive bruising down your right side, and across your back, though I am pleased that the X-rays didn't show any evidence of fractures to the ribs themselves. There is also a slight gash down your back, between your shoulder blades, however, no stitches were required for that. I was told by the members of International Rescue that brought you in, that you suffered a complete loss of movement in your lower limbs while at the accident scene; though there was no marked decline in sensation…Am I correct?"

I nodded again, willing him to just hurry up. The rest of them were silent, waiting with bated breath…

"I am extremely pleased with the MRI results that we received in relation to your spinal region, John. Though we initially feared that you had fractured the L3 and L4 vertebrae, the only damage we were able to detect was the pinching of your sciatic nerve. The sciatic nerve is the main nerve that runs through the lumbar region and down both legs. The injury was caused by a slipping of one of your disks on impact with whatever you hit, and the compression on the nerve was severe enough to cause the complete immobilisation of your lower limbs. I am sure it did not lessen any of the pain in your back, however."

I remembered back to the cracking sounds and the agonising snapping that had occurred back on Thunderbird Five; both following the explosion from the heat exchange, and then the twisting I had instigated when I was on the homemade backboard. I breathed a sigh of relief as the news sank in that I hadn't damaged my spinal cord. I listened attentively as Dr Abdul continued.

"With such a severe pinching of the nerve as you've experienced, the only type of treatment I can prescribe is complete and total rest for the next couple of weeks. The possibility of a reoccurrence of the paralysis is moderate to high, unless you refrain from attempting to move too abruptly or lift anything heavy. I have a few pamphlets to give you that will give you some gentle exercises and a list of things that you will be allowed to do during this period.'

'I expect that you will be in quite an amount of pain from this particular injury. I intend for you to be prescribed an additional, moderate to high-strength painkiller just for the first week or so, to allow you to adjust, and then you'll be weaned back to Ibuprofen, or something similar. In addition, I also want you to be supplied with a lightweight brace to keep your spine rigid during the rest period, to enable it to heal satisfactorily." The doctor frowned slightly, looking at Gordon curiously. "Yes, I thought you were the one who was injured in that hydrofoil accident." He smiled then. "I guess you'd know about managing back injuries, wouldn't you?"

Gordon nodded to him; gesturing for him to continue, guessing that there was more to come.

"Will I be allowed to stand or walk for any period? Even just to shower… or take care of… personal business? " I asked, attempting to be discreet, jumping in before he could begin again.

"Yes; though only for those particular things, and also for the exercises I mentioned. I'll have someone to keep track of your progress, or I can refer you to your general physician if you would prefer…" I dipped my head in response to that query, and I watched him add something to his notes.

"All in all, John," Dr Thomas said, "I'd say you are a very lucky young man in this respect. Considering the amount of rest and the pain management plan you'll need to be following, I can give you a tentative healing span from around six weeks, to up to perhaps something around the two month mark, though there may be residual pain from the sciatic compression in the future."

I beamed at my family and I was thrilled to see the looks on all of their faces with the confirmation that I would make a full recovery.

Wait.  My burgeoning happiness balloon was punctured as something Dr Thomas had said penetrated into my brain. ' In this respect'?

Doctors Thomas and Abdul looked at me, and I felt a flash of curious panic.  There's nothing else wrong with me… I only hit my back and head… What's going on?"

I looked at my Dad for answers; but he looked nonplussed as I felt, as did my brothers. Gordon and Scott looked worried, Alan was staring at me wide-mouthed, and Virgil was frowning as he looked contemplatively at the doctors.

"What else…" I swallowed dryly, attempting to find any trace of saliva to moisten my mouth and throat. "What else is there…?"

"When the A & E team were doing your initial examination, they detected a couple of curiosities in your vitals, such as an elevated temperature, and the presence of slightly enlarged lymph nodes beneath your jaw. Have you been experiencing cold or flu symptoms at all over the last few days, John?"

I felt my eyebrows narrow as I shook my head.

"The results from the blood test, showing a high white blood-cell count indicates an infection of some description. The A & E doctors took the liberty of sending off the labs to be tested; they should be back within the next fifteen to twenty minutes." Dr Abdul looked at me, his lips tightening slightly at the edges. "It is merely a precaution; we can put you on antibiotics just in case of infection. With the way your lungs are at the moment, I'd rather not take chances, not when I was planning on discharging you tomorrow if circumstances permit."

I couldn't help but feel the first stirrings of unease, and no— I didn't think that it was due to the still-lingering nausea. I remembered the headaches I'd been having, and the tiredness… Maybe I was coming down with a cold. That reminded me… I still hadn't told my Dad about the glitch in Five's systems… not that it really mattered now. I could tell from the grittiness in my eyes that I was starting to tire, and I noticed that Scott was looking quite droopy too.

Dr Abdul obviously realised, and without much more than a shake of the hand, and a kind nod to the rest of my family, he and Dr Thomas left, the former assuring us that he would be back soon in order to be present when the results of the labs were obtained.

At this point I could barely keep my eyes open, though I dearly wanted to. I was honestly surprised I had lasted this long… though the prospect of sleep was a welcome relief from the nausea I was still experiencing and the slight ache in my body despite the pain medication.

Dad laid his hand on my blanketed thigh, palm gentle as it rubbed soothing circles that I was so glad that I could feel. "Go to sleep, John." he told me, smiling tiredly. "We'll wake you when the doctor comes back. Get some rest…"

I nodded; yawning blearily as my eyelids slid closed. I was asleep immediately.


	10. And the Definitely Ugly

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: If not for Sylvia and Gerry Anderson, I would not be able to play in this wonderful playground, so no, I do not own the Thunderbirds.

I was floating in a rather pleasant haze when the time came for me to wake again. I knew that there was a reason why someone was tapping me on the cheek, but the words they were saying didn't seem to be registering in my dulled brain.

I was sure that I had been through this before, somewhere where I was as I was now; laid flat on my back, someone calling my name, rather insistently I might add. All I wanted was for whoever it was to stop it, and leave me to sleep. It was so nice and warm… and nothing was aching…

"John…" God that voice was annoying. "John… You need to wake up… the doctor's here."

"Huh?"  Oh, right…

As the memories came flooding in, I recalled the reason why the doctor was coming back, and that sent a shock of electricity running through my body. It left me well awake, and unpleasantly aware of the myriad aches of my battered body.

Smiling wanly at me, Dad cocked his head in the direction of the doctor; Abu or something, as he stood in the doorway, and I immediately sat up straighter, eager for him to deliver the news.

My brothers kind of crowded around us, taking no chances in not being able to hear any part of what the doctor had to say.

Scott, it appeared, hadn't even moved an inch from where he had sat when he had moved over to my bed the first time; the IV line still attached to his hand, the bag at the other end sitting on a pole behind his chair.

I winced in sympathy, knowing how much his head was probably aching as he sat upright; mine was agonising again, even though I was reclined against pillows at the head of the bed. The bright lights above my head certainly weren't helping.

"Do you mind if I sit down?" Doctor Abdul —for that was his name, I remembered— asked politely. His face was an emotionless mask, and wasn't giving me any clues as to what the results were.

Numbly, I nodded; the previous feeling of unease intensifying as the doctor pulled across one of the few spare chairs from the corner of the room, sitting in it, and placing his data pad on his knees.

"John." He began. "Your results unfortunately took a little longer than we had originally anticipated, due to the presence of a few anomalies within the blood sample. Your father, as he is obviously your next of kin, kindly passed your medical files on to me when you arrived, and I've taken them and compared them to your test results in the labs from half-an hour ago." He took a breath, and for the first time, I saw a flicker of sympathy on his face.

That simple observation sent what felt like a ton of rocks plummeting into my stomach. I suddenly realised I didn't want to listen to him. I knew what he was going to say, and I wanted to block my ears and refuse to hear it, for I knew exactly what was going to come out of his mouth, and I couldn't, I just wouldn't go through that again.

I really couldn't block my ears, due to the uselessness of one of my arms, so instead, I grabbed at anything within reach that I could dig my nails into in distress. Unfortunately, will alone was not enough to ensure that I couldn't hear what the man had to say.

"I'm sorry, John." Dr Abdul said grimly. "But even without the biopsy, and the additional tests that will need to be undertaken, it seems all of the signs point to some type of Non-Hodgkin's Lymphoma. They adequately match the labs and test results that you had last time… I'm so sorry."

NO!  I shouted in my head…  NO!  I felt callused fingers grab mine as I began to shake, and I shook my head in ignorance of the agony it caused, as I looked my eldest brother in distress, clenching my teeth until they creaked, as though by doing so, the reality I had come to discover would simply disappear.

I'm dreaming.  I thought miserably, closing my eyes.  I must be having a nightmare.

But the truth of the matter was that I wasn't dreaming; the pain in my body and soul was too strong for me to believe that theory one little bit. The things that had been happening to my body, that I hadn't even properly noticed, began to fill my mind, taunting me with the blatant, agonising evidence they presented as they slammed down on me.

The random episodes of dizziness, the exhaustion… The weight loss that my Dad had noticed but I hadn't; no doubt exacerbated because my stomach had not reminded me that I was supposed to eat… All were symptoms of the cancer I had barely managed to survive at fourteen years of age. I then realised that though I hadn't experienced it last time, the overly hot feeling that I had experienced at night for the last several weeks was also a symptom. Why hadn't I seen it for myself?

I heard indistinct voices echoing around me, and the world seemed to be moving in slow motion. I sensed that the doctor had left, presumably after saying something perfunctorily sympathetic. And then, we were alone.

I knew that I was shaking like a leaf with the shock of it all, and I came aware that my good hand was seizing up with the strength with which it was clinging to its possession. Looking down, I realised that I was still holding my father's hand, though holding was a simple term when you looked at the way my nails were creating bloody crescent moons where they had torn into his skin. He didn't really seem to mind; if anything, he was holding to mine almost —if not as tightly— as I was to his.

I could tell that I was beginning to hyperventilate; my breath coming in shuddering gasps, unable to draw a complete breath due to the confining brace on my midsection. There was a metallic taste coalescing in my mouth, and I felt hands push me back into the mattress as I began to cough harshly; ripping vibrations from the force of them reverberating painfully through my chest and back as I fought for breath.

I could hear Virgil and Scott's soothing tones, along with my father's calling for someone as the buzzing in my head increased. I struggled along with the instructions that filtered through my ears: "…deep breaths, John… in through the nose, out through your mouth… that's it, John…"

I felt the shuddering tempo of my heartbeat slow to a more normal rhythm, and I saw the world come back into focus.

"John…" The unfamiliar nurse flashed a penlight into my eyes as my brothers and father attempted to move away.

In a move that a five-year-old, rather than a twenty-two-year-old would have done, I refused to even think about letting go —my dad's hand was really the only thing that was currently preventing me from going headfirst over the edge. I felt a great sense of relief as I felt his grip tighten, and I nodded as the nurse rabbited on, asking me questions as she checked my vitals and the state of the IV lines.

Apparently satisfied that I was going to be 'alright', the nurse left me staring at the thick woollen blanket on my lap, afraid to face my brothers and father; worried to see the pain and disbelief that I knew was on all of their faces.

"John." This time it was my father's voice calling my name, calm with an undertone of worry that I could never resist attempting to alleviate.

Biting my lip, I raised my gaze to meet his and I nearly cried at the concern and love in his expression. "I won't ask if you are alright, son. I know you aren't; but I need to know what's going through your head, so we can help you." He gestured to himself and my siblings.

Scott was attempting to be calm, though I could see by the expression in his cobalt eyes that he was remembering exactly how ill I had been the last time. Laid low with glandular fever as he had been, I knew that even now, he still held the absurd notion that his illness had overshadowed the showing of my own symptoms.

He had been tired, sick and weak; confined to bed and then the homestead for well over two months, and yet he had still managed to look after me as I became basically poisoned by the drugs that were designed to save my life.

I could easily see that Virgil was beating himself up for not recognising my symptoms, though I could hardly blame him. He had only been about twelve years old last time, so I could hardly blame him for not remembering, not to mention the fact that I'd been up on the station for these last three weeks, so he couldn't have recognised them this time. His eyebrows were furrowed in concern, and his fingers were twisting together in his distress. Reaching over, as I extricated myself from my grip on my dad's hand, I laid mine on my brother's shoulder, with a single touch hoping to reassure him, even when I was still very close to panicking myself.

Gordon had only been ten at the time, and I hadn't been entirely sure how much he remembered from the events of eight years ago. Grandma had been able to take him and Alan out sometimes in order to give both Scott and myself a break from children who weren't entirely clear with what was going on. She and Dad had tried their very best to try and shield them both from the memories of both I and Scott being so ill, but I wasn't sure how well it had worked.

Gordon caught my gaze as he held our youngest brother in his arms. The fourteen-year-old had his face buried in our brother's chest, seemingly not caring that he had gone back to being a scared and insecure little boy when he wanted to be counted as a man. I was feeling very much the same way at this very moment, so I could hardly blame the kid for feeling that way in the slightest. Gordon himself had terror in his eyes, and I knew with sinking feeling that he remembered every moment; but all could really do was smile wanly at him, and tell him without speaking the empty line, 'it's going to be alright.'

My heart sank as my gaze moved back to my youngest brother. Alan had really been too young to remember how awful those few months had been. It was as a result of the toxic cocktail that had been pumped into me that my hair was not the golden blonde of my youngest brother anymore, but the almost-white platinum-blonde that it had been ever since it had grown back; irrevocably changed by the drugs that helped me in my battle to save my life.

I had been so relieved and glad that Alan alone out of my brothers wouldn't have to remember how I had ended up at the end of nearly eight months of brutal rounds of medication. There had been so many injections and so much vomiting from the chemo, that I still had pockmarks in the crooks of my arms and permanent scars on the inside of my throat, as on my chest where my Hickman implant had been.

I had finished the rounds of medication barely more than a skeleton from the amount of weight I had lost and there were many times where the very thought of food had made me ill. There were also a few occasions during that time where I had been in the hospital for weeks on end, as I tried to gain back something that I could use to fight my body's battle with. There was no chance of saving the kid from those experiences now.

Remembering my father's initial question, I asked the thought that had slammed into my brain as soon as I realised what the doctor was going to say to me.

"I thought that the possibility of relapse dropped off after five years?" I whispered hoarsely, holding onto the shred of hope that they were wrong; that the doctors had somehow mixed up my results with some other unfortunate. I couldn't recall everything the doctor had said at the time of my first diagnosis —I had been too much in terror and shock that I could die at only fourteen years old— to even think about trying to retain information.

My father shook his head, his eyes echoing the fear that I was trying hard to hide. "No, John. It is possible to have a relapse after five years. It just declines every year that passes. It doesn't mean that the risk vanished entirely."

His eyes were sad as he looked at me, and I knew that he was completely terrified, though he was trying hard not to show it. "We'll all be here, every step of the way." He promised, grabbing my hand again as he said the words.

My pale-faced brothers nodded numbly, but didn't say anything. How could I expect them to? I could barely string words together myself.

"You should get some sleep." My father told me quietly. "I need to speak to the doctors and administration about the possibility of transferring you to Topeka for your tests. I'm sure that you'd at least rather have Dr Kingston for familiarity?"

I nodded, smiling weakly, my jaw tight with tension. My father really knew me too well to not know that I would prefer my normal doctor and the oncologist who had been giving me my check-ups before, rather than complete strangers.

Making myself as comfortable as I could with the position of the brace, IV and my aching limbs, I knew that the shock would no doubt set in again when I woke, as well as the terrifying anticipation of what the staging process could unearth; but for now at least I could pretend that everything was fine.


	11. Light in Darkness

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: If not for Sylvia and Gerry Anderson, I would not be able to play in this wonderful playground, so no, I do not own the Thunderbirds.

I knew when I opened my eyes that it was night-time.

In the fogginess of a mind still clouded with sleep and the blissful haze of drug-induced numbness, I didn't quite realise why I had awoken, at least without the neuro-checks, until I shifted, only to grunt in disgust at the feeling of soaked-sweat sheets tangled around my body.

Somehow, despite my position as a patient of a hospital, I had forgotten what exactly was wrong with me. Attempting to sit up, rather in a hurry as I was to escape the cloying dampness of the material that covered my skin, I was shocked into wakefulness when I was met with a fierce roar of pain blasting from my lower back.

That was a really bad idea. White lights popped in front of my eyes, and I gasped as I flopped back down to relieve the stabbing. Was it really too much to ask of my body to avoid landing on my injured side?

Apparently, my grunting was enough to wake my father who —presuming from the blanket that pooled in his lap as he sat beside my bed— had clearly been asleep as the events of the day caught up to him.

"John?" He muttered, squinting at me through eyes suddenly alert with the worry over the invalid. "Whassamatter?" His gaze moved over me, noting the rumpled bedcovers and the look on my face, which was surely drawn tight with pain, strumming through me with every movement.

"'M all wet, Dad." I hated myself for the vulnerability I could hear in my own voice, and I could see that my father could hear it too; as his eyes softened and his lips tightened in understanding.

He reached for something just past my head, and I realised that the call button for the nurses was there, and it had never even crossed my mind to search for it. Not a second later, another faceless nurse appeared in the shadows of the doorway; white shirt turned to grey in the light that was spilling from the hallway behind her.

"What seems to be the problem, Mr Tracy?" Gah. That was getting to be annoying very fast.

I swallowed, slightly embarrassed that I couldn't go and change out of my damp clothes myself. "I've sweated through my sheets…" I sighed. "I need someone to help me change…"

Her face was kind as she replied, obviously sensing my mortification. "It's alright. I'll get you some fresh clothing, and I'll get one of the orderlies to change the bedsheets. Would you prefer your father to help you change? I know that you'd probably much rather do it on your own, but that arm and back of yours aren't going to be of much use, I'm afraid."

I nodded in relief. It was true that I would prefer to continue to be independent and self-sufficient, but I couldn't even raise myself to a seated position at the moment, let alone be able to change myself with any kind of ease. It really killed me to admit it to myself that I was practically as helpless as a baby in that area, at least until my spine had healed enough not to spontaneously explode every few seconds.

As both my father and the nurse helped me to the bathroom, me gripping tightly to the IV pole that was trailing a tube from my hand for a little extra support, I furrowed my brows.

Despite the stickiness the secretion of sweat had left on my body, I was relatively clean in comparison to how I had been a few hours ago. Beneath the lightweight brace that wrapped around my lower torso, I wore a light set of hospital-issue cotton pyjamas and a clean white support sling was wrapped around my right shoulder. Evidently, I had been changed earlier out of the tattered civvies I had been wearing beneath my flight-suit, but try as I might, I couldn't recall any kind of memory that gave credence to the situation. I must have been too doped up on the pain meds to care.

Once I was once again freshly dressed in crisp, warm cotton, I pulled the covers back up to my chin. I had slid back into dozy-land within moments.

##

I knew that it was morning the next time I awoke, from the sight of the cold, grey light of dawn filtering through the gap in the curtains on the far side of the room. I noticed my father was curled back beneath the blanket on his seat, in a position that I knew that he was going to be paying for all day.

Squinting past him to the bed near the far wall, I discovered that all I could see of Scott was the shape of the blankets over his slumbering form, and the tousled cocoa hair that was sticking up past the edge of the material. It also appeared that he had lost his needle attachment sometime during the night. I felt a pang of envy at that, though I grinned at the sight of him.

As usual, my brother had somehow managed to abandon his pillow, and had shuffled his way down to the bottom of the mattress, where he had curled into a ball in a rather odd attempt to conserve any kind of body heat he could. It was one of the stranger quirks my brother had possessed his entire life; having shared a room with him until I was twelve, when Dad had finally split the attic into two to accommodate a teenaged Scott. As a result of those twelve years, I knew his sleeping habits remarkably well.

At the time though, as the event had given me my own room, I was just glad that I could climb up onto the roof without anyone being any the wiser, at least until I was fourteen, where just before Christmas, Scott had inadvertently locked me out of my room when coming to fetch me for dinner.

It was only when he was sleeping that Scott lost all evidence of the experiences life had thrown at him in his almost-twenty-five years. The mere five hours of sleep the villa's resident insomniac had a night had a way of melting away the slight frown gained from running after four siblings, and the pressure of being deputy commander of IR. They just ceased to exist in the few hours he slept each night, and it reminded me of the many times as a child that I had watched securely from my own bed, and had seen a much younger Scott Tracy slumber. I could imagine it now, even though I couldn't currently see his face.

My relatively peaceful contemplation of my eldest brother was shattered at that very moment, as I remembered the exact night he had discovered my rooftop escapades, and why Scott had been so ticked off to find me standing soaked out on my balcony.

In my defence of his worry over me, it hadn't actually been raining when I had shimmied my way up the trellis near my window just after lunch. I had dressed sensibly for the weather in a thick sweater and wool hat, but I had lost track of time; only becoming aware of just how long I had been up there when I found that I was getting cold from the chilly December evening, and had realised that the sky was darkening rather swiftly. I was just lucky I hadn't gotten a cold on top of everything else I was dealing with at the time, not to mention that I was even able to keep dinner down, in addition to Scott not ratting me out to Dad.

Thinking back gloomily on my physical state that day, I knew that I would doubt be feeling similarly in the near future. Now that I was for all intents and purposes, alone as I would be for a while, I allowed myself to fall victim to the terror that was rising again in my heart, as I contemplated the battle that would be coming over the next few months.

It just wasn't fair! In the last twenty-four hours, I had come close to dying at least twice; first with the impact to 'Five that had could have meant I may have never regained consciousness if I had happened to hit my head much harder. Then there was the fact that five-sixths of my family; myself included, could have never woken up from the sleep the oxygen deprivation had sent us into up on the stricken station.

It just seemed infinitely and grossly unfair to have let me survive both encounters with the cloaked guy, and to have given me some measure of relief that I had come out of them —though battered and bruised as I was— relatively unscathed. Then the Fates had to go and drop this doozy of a bombshell on me!

It sucked.

As my anguished thoughts rocketed through my head even faster than the speeds Thunderbird One was capable of, I couldn't help but let out an angry sob at the injustice of it all.

Why did this have to happen now? Why now, when I was comfortable, happy and at peace with my part in life? It just seemed terrible to comprehend that I was able to give disembodied instructions to trapped and injured civilians, and guide my brothers and father in how to rescue them from my place in the sky, but I was unable to protect my own body from attacking itself from the inside!

Hiccupping slightly, as I silently raged at the impossibilities of my body, I simultaneously winced as I was reminded of the damage that had been inflicted on it during the last day, and it was as though once I paid attention to one injury the others wanted to be noticed too. Shifting painfully as the fiery sensation of my damaged back rose to the forefront of my mind, I yelped as I rolled onto my stiff right shoulder; stabbing sensation reintroduced with the apparent fading of my pain meds.

Clearly, my father's slumber wasn't as deep as I had first thought. At the merest sound of my grunted suppression of the sudden pain, his eyes were open and he was leaning over me, reminding me of when I was sick as a child, as he tenderly brushed my overlong bangs out of my face. It was still gritty with dust and smoky residue from 'Five, and I realised that I really wanted and needed a proper shower.

"Hi." I gritted as my back protested any tiny movement. "What's the time?" It was rather a strange question when my body seemed intent on telling me exactly how much it was yearning for pain meds, but I just wanted to know if it was a reasonable time in the morning to get clean, and perhaps even go home… I'd been here through the afternoon and all night. Surely that was long enough for observation?

My father shook his head at me slightly, smiling, but he raised his left hand to examine the digits on his watch-face anyway.

"It's a quarter past seven." He told me, pushing his chair back and spreading his arms. There was a multitude of popping, cracking sounds as he stretched his spine, and I winced. I had always hated that sound, Virgil and Gordon did it with their knuckles all the time, it never failed to make me grimace. "Your brothers said that they'll be back around eight o'clock."

At my enquiring look, he elaborated. "I sent them to a hotel around ten; they wanted to stay with you and Scott, but your brother basically ordered them to hop to it, and you know that there's no point arguing with him when he's in a mood."

"'Hoo in a moo'?"

Speak of the devil… Scott Tracy; former Air-Force member, Deputy Commander of International Rescue, and pilot of Thunderbird One, is not very coherent nor exactly aware of his surroundings first thing in the morning.

I hid a smirk as my brother emerged from his nest. He obviously tidied himself before presenting to us in the morning on the island as well; adult Scott was a fright when he'd just woken up! His hair was mussed, and there was a pretty good amount of stubble appearing near his sideburns.

Cobalt-violet eyes, usually sharp and precise beneath his fringe of dark hair, were right now squinting, dazed, and not entirely aware of the situation; though that could be due to the headache he probably had too, I thought fairly.

"You." I told him. "Doing a Dad and ordering the kids back to some hotel."

As he raised his eyebrows, I gestured to the eldest man present as he had apparently discovered the truth of my earlier observation about uncomfortable positions, muttering curses beneath his breath as his stiff back protested. "Too bad you couldn't tackle him too."

My brother, marginally more awake now that he had processed the situation, though nowhere near up to his normal standards, shook his head disbelievingly in reply. "I didn't even bother to try, John."

And to the indignation of our father, we both began to laugh.


	12. At Bay

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: If not for Sylvia and Gerry Anderson, I would not be able to play in this wonderful playground, so no, I do not own the Thunderbirds.

When Scott and I had caught our breath —me wincing as my ribs and back protested the movement— certain aspects of my memories of the past day entered my mind. I hated myself for bringing up the topic, but I needed to know what had happened while I had been zonked out on Thunderbird Three.

The haunted look that I had noticed in both my father's and Scott's eyes deepened as I asked my questions, and I was appalled at what had happened within the Bank.

Anger against the utter madman who had tried and nearly succeeded in murdering myself, my family, and my friends burned white-hot in my throat, as they revealed that my youngest brother had nearly been shredded by the Mole's blades. Then pride at the fact that he was then forgiving enough to spare the monster who wouldn't have hesitated in the slightest to watch Alan fall to his death almost eclipsed it.

I knew that my other brothers and I would not be anywhere near as humane. We'd have all stood by quite happily and cheered at the demise of the man called 'The Hood'. I considered it a terrible bit of misfortune that the bastard was still alive; I would much rather he be dead, and then we wouldn't have to worry about the possibility of him being able to escape and come back for round two.

I knew that my youngest brother would be having a terrible time with the aftermath of the attack. He was still only a kid, and there was no way he'd be able to escape nightmares in relation to the horrid events of the day before.

I found myself surprised that I hadn't dreamed last night of a burning Thunderbird Five tearing violently apart amidst fire, smoke and the immense vista of captivation that was the cosmos. I felt sure however, that the delay was only due to my exhaustion from everything that had happened.

I knew that when I added the introduction of the stresses of my relapse and the inevitable rounds of medication that awaited me in the future, there would be no chance of me escaping them then. I was pleased though, that I would be able to be there to help support my brothers and father as they battled with the demons of their own aftermath.

##

Surprisingly, I was hungry for the first time in ages; for when my breakfast tray arrived, along with Scott's not ten minutes later, the bowl of cardboard cornflakes looked appetising rather than utterly and completely disgusting. Judging by the look on my brother's face, it appeared that my opinion was in total opposites to what he was thinking. I just dug in, used to the plain, bland microwaveable meals that were regular cuisine for me up on the station, so I wasn't much bothered by it. I was more thrilled that I was actually hungry enough to enjoy it; I knew that it was a sensation that I wouldn't be experiencing for much longer.

##

After a shower, where I had been embarrassedly assisted into a loose pair of jeans, and a button-up shirt that allowed for the presence of the sling and brace, I had been led back to the room; and had settled myself in relative comfort back on my pile of pillows as Scott, then my father had taken their turns.

We'd been sitting there for a while, as I stared rather placidly at the ceiling in wait for someone to come back with the discharge papers for Scott and I, as well as the referral letter to Dr Kingston in Topeka, but unfortunately, the item that the dark-haired nurse from last night had also brought with her had caused me to frown in consternation.

Nuh-uh. No way. I glared at the nurse as she gestured for me to move over to the seat.

I didn't budge an inch but to do an approximation of crossing my arms. To my immense dissatisfaction, my right arm did not have a way to link with the other one, due to its unfortunate position in the support sling. Realising that that might just cause enough of a distraction for them to get me to do what they wanted, I quickly shifted until I was in a firmer position on my perch on the edge of the bed.

"John." My father was quickly losing patience with me, as I had drawn out the minutes in my refusal to sit in the damned wheelchair. I didn't care.

In an uncharacteristic show of temper and Tracy stubbornness, I wanted to walk out of the hospital under my own steam. I would be spending more than enough time unable to walk from the enforced bed-rest from my injuries, and the weakness I would be looking forward to from my illness, and forgive me if I wanted to exercise my last bit of freedom in the way  I wanted. Who cared if it was at the expense of hospital protocol?

I sighed as my answered my own question. Clearly, my father did.

"Would you just get in the damn chair already?" He said exasperatedly. "You're acting like a four-year-old." He raised his eyebrows questioningly. "Do you really want to still be here when your brothers get back from loading the car?"

I pressed my lips together into a thin line. No, I didn't want to give Gordon the satisfaction, but by God; I hated wheelchairs with a passion.

Scott, having been surprisingly silent up until this point, spoke up from where he was leaning against the footboard of his bed, clad in fresh jeans and his old leather bomber jacket. The only clue that he had even actually been a fellow patient was the fresh patch of gauze covering the dissolving stitches holding the gash on his forehead together. It would leave a rather impressive scar, but the flop of his fringe would cover it. I could tell that he was rather pleased when he had come to that realisation.

"Ya know, Johnny," he drawled. "I'd much prefer the chair to Gordy. At least then he'd have a sense of courtesy and won't prank you on account of you being injured."

I had to admit that the guy had a point. I could plead infirmity if the prankster tried anything more than simple teasing. I let out a gush of air from between my teeth as I swallowed my pride, standing up tentatively before turning and grudgingly lowering myself into the seat, letting out a slight grunt of discomfort as I settled against the backrest. It wasn't a moment too soon, as my three younger brothers appeared in the doorway.

I could tell that Virgil had immediately guessed why we were still collectively gathered in the tiny privatised room, but to my eternal happiness, he declined to mention it.

Gordon and Alan picked up the small duffel-bag that held the toiletries and other items that had been brought from the island for the three of us, debating something about which baseball team was going to win this year's league.

As the nurse pushed the chair out into the corridor, I caught my dad and Scott exchange amused looks at my compliance, and rolled my eyes. They really couldn't talk. I'd have thought they could see that it was them who had taught me, along with the other three how to be unbearably difficult when it came time to do something. Heaven knew how many times I had taken it upon myself to talk one or both of them into backing down on an argument and attempt to get them to see where the other person was coming from.

I sat uncomfortably in the wheelchair as the nurse and my trail of family members escorted me down to the lift in the hallway on the edge of the ward. Realising as the doors opened, that it was rather a small elevator, I suggested that my father and brothers take the stairs. I really doubted that five relatively well-built males, a tall nurse and a guy in a wheelchair were going to fit comfortably in the small space, and I really didn't like the idea of being towered over by people who were usually my height or shorter. When they all looked at me askance, I sighed, and spoke resignedly.

"Fine." I said calmly, though I could feel my temper rising. I really wanted to leave as soon as possible. "One of you stay, and I'll meet the rest of you at the entrance."

As my brothers all began to protest that they were going to be the one to stay, my dad spoke firmly over the top of them, making me grin. It really was touching to know that they didn't want to let me out of their sight, but I had to admit that I was finding it a little claustrophobic. My heart sank as I realised that it was only going to get worse the closer I got to an official, complete diagnosis.

"I'll stay with John, and the rest of you will take the stairs. I highly doubt that we're going to run away, seeing as it'll take the same amount of time to get downstairs as it will to do this. I don't know about you lot, but I want to get home as soon as possible."

Nodding, but ceasing their grumbling, I watched as my brothers retreated, and the three of us rode down through the levels of St. Thomas hospital in silence. Leaving us at the doors, the nurse, who I finally realised was named Kelly, told us to return the wheelchair at the front desk when I was settled into the car. It wasn't long until we were joined by my brothers.

I had to smirk, watching from my seat in the second row, as Scott coaxed my father out of his apparently pre-claimed position as driver of the large eight-seater van that he had rented; explaining that he was obviously the only one who was actually licensed to drive on English roads, because of the academic year he had spent there while studying at Oxford University.

I was just amused at the memory from Thunderbird Three the day before, but rather than being the one who was observing the events, Jeff Tracy was the one being meekly pushed out of the driver's seat; the only difference between now, and the outcome from Virgil's tussle with Gordon the day before.

Another memory I was reminded of as we set off, speeding down the motorway headed to Heathrow Airport, was the many times that we had travelled as children; Scott in the shotgun seat, the two youngest in the middle, and Virgil and I in the back in an attempt to distance ourselves from whatever nefarious plot the Terrible Two were planning now, it was obviously different; with Virge and I in the middle seats, so he could 'keep an eye' on me and Scott simultaneously, and Gordy and Al in the back, but all the memories swimming round in my head were enough to keep my mind off the way jolts of pain that shot through my spine with every pothole we rode, despite the care I knew that Scott was taking.

I was glad that Dad in all his foresight had banned all photographs and other such paraphernalia of us as we were growing up. It meant that our entrance into the crowded hub didn't garner as much attention as it could have. Only he himself was immediately recognisable, but due to the simple action of Alan lending him the dark-blue cap that he was wearing, we were able to get to the hangar storing Tracy One without any delays.

Before long, I found myself reclined somewhat comfortably in one of the seats in the passenger plane; happily doped up on the pain meds that Virgil had hidden the extras of somewhere in the cabin. I wasn't worried in the slightest, I knew that I'd be re-dosed if I needed it. But right now, I was free from the stark white hospital, if only temporarily and I was headed home with my family.

I could definitely ask for more —like the idea of not having to face hell all over again— but a person could only get so much in life before the fates began extracting their price. I only wished I knew what it was I had done to deserve it.


	13. Lawrence

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: If not for Sylvia and Gerry Anderson, I would not be able to play in this wonderful playground, so no; I do not own the Thunderbirds.  
> Also, I am obviously not a doctor of any kind; any information on medical topics mentioned here is off the web. Please enjoy guys!

Not long after we had lifted off from the airport, Virgil and my father in the cockpit, I had found myself drowsing with the combined effects of the drugs, and my own fatigue as they coursed simultaneously through my system. I was fighting it with my every breath, becoming more and more terrified of what the next few days would come out with, in terms of the level of severity my cancer had reached.

I knew that now my injuries were on the mend, my mind would be free to offload on me with images of both the attack to my family, and the memories of my fourteen-year-old self as I fought to live for a family that had already known too much heartbreak.

I knew now that there was absolutely no chance that my body wasn't waging war against itself, and I found myself turning away in my seat to face the window next to my head as I struggled to keep my composure. Haze rose in my eyes as it finally, properly hit me that I was again, going to be fighting against death.

Even if my illness had come back as a cancer that differentiated from the type I had developed as an adolescent (as was possible), there was also a greater chance that it was much more malignant and fast-growing than before. I knew enough from the little that I had read as a teen about my disease that it was going to be a much tougher battle to survive this time around.

Due to my ability to easily decipher science-speak, even at such an early age, I had understood much more in the case studies than my father ever knew— though only particular snippets of information had actually registered past my fear of my own mortality. Those studies had examined the time-versus-severity theory, and it indicated that in many cases, despite the risk of relapse declining rapidly with each passing year, if a refractory case was to occur, all-round severity and the grading for the cancer rose substantially.

I was terrified.

##

Once again, I must have fallen asleep; not that anyone could blame me; I could hear the sound of people moving quietly about me, and I knew that we had landed. I moaned a little as there was a loud thump, and then I heard Scott's voice hiss. "Alan; shut up, you'll wake John!"

"He's already awake." I grunted, shifting slightly as my back decided that the position I had been sleeping in wasn't conducive to proper healing.

Opening my eyes as I tried to alleviate the stiffness without igniting the flames, I came face-to-face with Gordon, who immediately grabbed my bad arm with his left, and slid his right arm around the small of my back, helping me tip forwards into a surprisingly painless position. I blinked. I had apparently, somehow forgotten that my younger brother had a bad back as well. He did such a good job at covering it most of the time.

"Thanks." I told him, smiling gratefully when there didn't seem to be a spike of pain coming anytime soon. "You have to show me how to do that; the whole nuclear-explosion-in-my-back thing really wasn't working too well."

Gordon grinned, green eyes sparkling at the prospect of an impromptu war-of-words, as was our habit.

"Ya just don't got enough patience, equanimity and self-restraint, Johnny-me-boy." The kid had the audacity to drawl at me in the mock-insolent tone he had when he deemed himself to know more than his older (and infinitely wiser) brother, and I raised an eyebrow at him in challenge.

Flashing my hand up —which I was rather proud of right then— I flicked the kid right on the nose. I smirked as he squawked rather comically, trying rather unsuccessfully to duck out of the way, and then I laughed outright at him as he walked straight into the smack that Scott palmed at the back of his head.

"I'm pretty sure we taught you to speak properly Gords. All that time in the bay with the fish has addled your brains." Smirking knowingly at me, Scott headed to the cockpit, no doubt to confer with Dad and Virgil.

The kid opened his mouth, presumably to argue his case, but changed tack as he noticed Al coming back from the direction of the bathroom, hat reclaimed and matching blue eyes relatively calm despite the situation. "Alan! Hey, my brother, my buddy… pal! Help me out here!"

Alan, –bless his soul– having spent way too much time with Gordon to be appropriately swayed by the guy's charm, looked at him warily; his eyes flicking between the two of us, wondering whether he should he help his anxious brother, or stay out of it entirely. "What did you do?"

"Nuffin." Damn Gordon. There was a self-satisfied grin on his face as he sat there, winding me up effortlessly, and I couldn't even move fast enough to sit on him and force him to surrender.

"Johnny's being mean and telling me to speak proper English. We can't speak proper English; we aren't English and anyway; as adolescents it's our job to peeve off the elderly population with our terrible speech and mannerisms."

My eyes widened in mild outrage, and I forgot about Alan entirely, not minding that I hadn't said anything to him anyway.  Elderly? I'll give you goddamned elderly!

Grinning menacingly, I grabbed the little brat with my good arm. Lucky for me, he hadn't moved away from the lion he was taunting.

Pressing my palm into the back of his neck, he squirmed uncomfortably as my fingers caught a tight grip on the lengthening hair. I was struggling as I barely maintained my grip. Injured as I was, it was really hard to manage; someone had been working out with our elder brother, though the pain of several pressure points being depressed was enough to give me a little bit of an advantage. Just when it seemed that I would be losing this particular skirmish, help came from the most unlikely of sources.

"Aieeeeeyah!" 127 pounds of solid-muscled teenager ploughed into the redhead. Alan more or less threw himself onto Gordon's lap, hooking his feet onto the armrests to either side of him as nimble fingers sank into their targets on both sides of Gordon's torso.

I watched in amazement as Gordon immediately stilled in the chair. Looking at his face, I smirked to see the wary look that he was giving our youngest brother. Gordon Tracy has a weakness!

I grinned at the realisation that Alan could be very formidable if he wanted. Inevitably, as the youngest he had to have some sort of blackmail material, and obviously the jump Alan had on Gordon was something huge to cause his current reaction.

Gordon looked as though he was in shock. "Alan." he whispered, betrayal in his eyes. "That isn't fair!" The lower lip stuck out and the puppy dog eyes emerged. "We're supposed to be a team!"

Al only raised a single blonde brow. I was fascinated. Someone who was immune to Gordon's powers of getting what he wanted, when he wanted….  Cool!

There was a few seconds of seemingly silent conversation between them, but then Al's fingers moved from their threatening position, and he shimmied off of the eighteen-year-old's knees.

Gordon visibly deflated as I watched the interplay between the two of them. I wondered if they could read each other's minds. Scott and Virgil were very much the same in the way that subtle gestures and movements were enough to hold an entire conversation. In rescues, it was a fabulous skill to have. In everyday situations, not nearly so much.

"Uh, John." Gordon said tentatively. "Could you let go of my hair?"

Sheepishly, I untangled my fingers from the back of Gordon's neck, raising an eyebrow, much as Alan had done a minute ago.

Mission rescue-brother-John accomplished, said brother was currently packing everything back into his rucksack, but it didn't stop him shooting a Look over at me as if to say,  I handled it for you… don't go and start him off again.

I was astonished. When in the heck had Alan become so perceptive?  Oh yeah. Yesterday, when the three kids almost single-handedly saved the world.

Nodding at him in thanks as Gordon beat a hasty retreat to his own corner, I was distracted by the view out of the window to my right. Rather than the steel and rock walls of Tracy One's hangar on the island, I was met by the sight of the interior of the old building where my father had stored his first jet and the old crop duster that was on our family farm in Kansas.

I whistled quietly. "When you guys said we were going home, I didn't think you meant that we'd be heading back here! I thought we were heading straight –"

"–To the island?" Scott had returned with Virgil and Dad, though it was the latter who answered my question.

"I was intending for us to just go there and a few of us would take a couple days' trip over here for your tests, but I was basically ordered by both Onaha and Kyrano that we were all to come straight here, and that they'd take care of cleaning up the island. Your grandmother was very much in agreement. In fact," He continued, looking at his watch. "She said that she'd have lunch for us by the time we got here."

I hid a groan at that. I loved my grandmother, truly I did. It was just that in her affection and wanting to care for all of us, I knew too well her tendency over-mother, when we'd much prefer we be left alone. I was feeling utterly crappy as it was, and I really didn't feel like dealing with an overzealous grandparent.

I sighed. Really, who was I to deprive my grandmother of a chance to mother a grandson? At least it was clear where Scott had inherited his mother-hen streak from.

##

It wasn't half as bad as I had initially feared. Ruth Tracy, God bless her, seemed to realize by the look on my face how exhausted I was by the mere effort it took to descend the stairs of the plane and walk the several feet to the old van that we used to use when we were growing up. By the time we had gotten to the house, and I had walked up the drive, I was just about ready to drop.

True, we were all suffering from a degree of jet-lag, and I was always off for a couple days after descending from Thunderbird Five, but this was just getting ridiculous. Somehow, I was even more in trepidation as to what the next few days would bring.

The only thing I could think of to explain it was the presence of the cancer in my body. Combined with the pain I was still in from my strained shoulder, my head and stupid back, and the strong medication that was my sanity at the moment, I really wasn't surprised that my body had had taken out of it all that was possible for it to give.

Upon the sight of me leaning heavily on Scott and Virgil as we reached the veranda, Grandma immediately clucked her tongue over my appearance, and merely directed my brothers to guide me to the room on the left-hand side of the bottom floor. I would have much preferred that I was able to sleep in my childhood bedroom —which I knew that my overactive grandmother would have maintained while she was living in the area— but with the sad physical state I was in at the moment, I knew that there was no way I would be able to make the stairs, even if I was stubborn enough to try.

I was getting sick of being so endlessly tired all of the time; spending my time sleeping was not something I generally did. That was more Virgil than me at any time of the day, but I knew that I was probably better off asleep, the more rested my body was to be able to fight the better. It didn't even cross my mind that I would miss lunch, because barely as soon as my elder and immediate younger brothers had left the room, I was out like a light.

##

The sight was horrendous, and utterly, terrifyingly real. I could see the fire approaching, smoke was pouring from the side of the ruined wall of my poor ship, but that was the least of my worries.

I couldn't move. I had hit my lower back, not my neck! I couldn't move a single part of me, I couldn't speak, and I couldn't make a single sound. I could only stare and scream out inside as the fire encroached on every single member of my family. I was choking; the smoke was suffocating and making it impossible to breathe. But it didn't matter. My family was burning before my eyes, and I couldn't do a single damn thing to stop it!

I watched in horror as the flames reached Alan first. Scott had attempted to keep him the furthest away from the barbequed console that was causing the problem, but it had nevertheless reached him anyway. Virgil and Gordon were attempting to smother the flames at the source, while Dad tried to keep Alan at bay as he insisted that he could be a Thunderbird, he could use the Firefly to smother the flames… but Alan wasn't even supposed to be up here!

There was an explosion, and the console where Gordon and Virgil were was obliterated in a roiling sea of flame. Dad was next as he instinctively tried to get to them; shielding them from the horror of burning alive. They were gone!

I turned to see Scott covering a fallen Alan with his own body, but the flames were licking at his boots. Finally, I became aware that I could move, but I was too late. With a roar, the flames engulfed my eldest and youngest brothers simultaneously. The last thing I saw and heard was Scott holding Alan tightly against his chest, and the screams as the last members of my family perished.

"NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!"

My eyes snapped open wide. I half expected to see the darkened recesses of the doomed Thunderbird Five above me, but rather than the singed ceiling of the station, I only saw the wooden support beams of the spare room.

Drenched with sweat and trembling, I ripped wildly at the restraining blankets as I fought to escape the terror of the nightmare. It had been made so intensely real by my beleaguered mind that it was difficult to completely convince myself that it wasn't.

My chest heaved, gasping for breath that didn't seem to be coming in a hurry. I was too hot, wet and sticky to be doing myself much good, not to mention my head was splitting open, and my spine felt like it was being twisted apart. I felt frayed, like an old scarf that had the stitches coming loose and the center of me was unraveling.

In that moment, I wished that I was a child again. I wanted my Dad to come and set things right, to come and hold me tightly as I slipped back into sleep; content and sure in my heart that nothing was out to get me.

But it wasn't true.

I sobbed as I wrestled with blankets that refused to part with my denim-clad legs, despite the spears of pain I felt stabbing into me with every movement.

I cried out in anguish, and then I heard running feet. Suddenly, hands were untangling the covers twisted beneath me, and then a pair of strong arms wrapped around my wet, sticky body. With my good arm, I clenched my fist in the thick material of my father's sweater and clung to him with all my strength.

"Shh. John. It's alright….It's all going to be okay."

"It isn't Dad." I sobbed. "It isn't, 'cause I'm scared and I don't want to be sick again."

I didn't care that I was a grown man, and by all rights, should be able to deal with my own problems. Barring that, I was a Tracy, and by God, Tracys didn't show weakness. It had always been so hard not to show emotion. I had always been more sensitive to showing my emotions than the rest of my brothers, except perhaps Alan. We both just had too much of Mom in us, Virgil and Scott were both just too much Dad, and Gordon was more of a mix of both parents. But really, at that moment, I didn't give a flying frick. I was terrified out of my mind.

I felt my father's arms tighten around me, and I felt a little safer in the knowledge that he was here for me when I needed him. I had called, and he had come for me…  Just like he promised you John.

I felt myself suddenly slipping into sleep, the terror of the nightmare abruptly being crushed by the overwhelming presence that was my dad, chasing away the bad feelings that were too strong for me to handle on my own.

I couldn't remember who it was who had said it, but I had always taken it to heart.

Apart we are weak and can be easily overwhelmed. United we are strong, and nothing can tear us down.

I could only hope that it proved true this time.


	14. Fire and Rain, Part One

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: If not for Sylvia and Gerry Anderson, I would not be able to play in this wonderful playground, so no; I do not own the Thunderbirds.

By the time the evening meal came around, I had slept for a number of hours, not stirring until Gordon had come in to get me into the dining room.

I was getting kind of annoyed with having to hang off my brothers for support. I wondered absently if my father wouldn't mind getting a pair of crutches from somewhere; I wouldn't be able to use both because of my injured shoulder, but at least then I wouldn't be killing my brothers' backs with having to drag my carcass around the house. I'd figure that out later. At the moment I was just trying to cope.

It started with Grandma. I had barely entered the room, where they were all sitting at the table, before she had risen, and was hovering over me, admittedly getting in the way as I shook Gordon's helping hands away from my shoulders as I reached my chair.

I was feeling positively awful by now. I had a splitting headache and my back was aching fiercely despite the meds my second-youngest brother had given me before I had left the comfort of my bed. And then there was the fact that due to the worry twisting around in my stomach, and the overall loss of appetite I had been exhibiting, I really wasn't hungry at all.

I could see that my grandmother (and most likely Alan) had created a roast with everything possible needed to enjoy the meal, but the look of it turned my stomach.

It seemed that the others had forgotten that I could never cope with richer foods when I came down from the station, and thus hadn't informed Grandma. I told myself that I wouldn't take any of the marinated meat or the cranberry stuffing that had been made for the pork. I just hoped that I would be able to choke down enough peas and mashed potato to satiate my energy needs, but I really wasn't optimistic.

I didn't say anything though, wary of hurting their feelings; but then Grandma insisted on cutting up my meal before she gave it to me, and Alan tried to help me from his spot on my right as he poured me a glass of juice from the pitcher in the middle of the table. They were treating me as though I automatically couldn't do it. They hadn't even let me try.

The others were watching me surreptitiously from the corners of their eyes, and I suddenly felt the walls closing in on me, feeling as though I were an interesting species of animal on display at the zoo.

I really didn't mean it, but my patience snapped.

"Get away from me!" I yelled. I just couldn't cope with them all hovering over me. I struggled to my feet as I tried to stay upright. Immediately, three pairs of hands reached to steady me, the rest of them rising out of their chairs in readiness to bolt around the table to catch me if I fell.

I leaned away from all of them, feeling my normally non-existent temper rise instantly well past nuclear levels. A heartbeat as I attempted to calm down, but then the pyroclastic volcano exploded.

"Leave me alone, the lot of you! I am not an invalid, I can do things, and if it so happens I can't, I'll ask for help! I assure you, I may have cancer, I may be fighting for my life, but I will get past this! I do not need you guys hovering over me like so many mother hens, as if I'm gonna fall over or shatter at any second! Just leave me  ALONE !"

My brain pounding beneath the agonising sound of my own voice, I staggered back from the table, glaring at the lot of them as they stared at me with an array of different expressions on their faces.

Scott and Virgil were the calmest, considering they'd both seen me at my worst temper-wise. Both had been my go-to in the times where the guys at school had seen fit to punch on loner John Tracy. Though Virgil was two years younger than me, he had always been much bigger and stronger physically, if not taller, and he had always been there when Scott couldn't be; taking our elder brother's place in helping me take on the bullies who had made my life hell because of my smarts, and my shorter, skinnier build.

I had hated that I needed my little brother to help me fight my battles; but we had become closer than we would have otherwise.

Gordon, used to someone in the family bellowing the house down at one time or another —usually after him and his practical jokes— was shocked, but he had a knowing look in his eyes that told me he knew what I was feeling. I knew that our family had done precisely the same thing following his recovery from the hydrofoil accident he had been in when he was sixteen.

Both my father and grandmother had identical looks of incredulous anger on their faces. Neither had seen or heard me so much as raise my voice in my entire life; it had always been talking brother to brother rather than father to son that us boys had always practiced, after the time we had dealt with our grief over losing Mom on our own.

Grandma had never even been given cause to suspect that I had even the hint of the temper I was displaying, and if it weren't for the fact I was so mad at her, I would have laughed at the look she had at my 'lack of respect'.

Alan merely looked as though he was in shock. I was barely at home most of the time he was on school breaks, and I didn't think he had ever seen me lose my temper. Sure, he had had many eruptions of his own in his head-to-head battles against our father in the last few months, but I was the brother he knew the least, and I realised that I must have looked terrifying. He was kind of huddled as far as he could into the back of his chair; wide blue eyes terrified in his pale face. That was what calmed me somewhat.

Still breathing heavily, with a combination of pain, confusion and residual anger over the situation still coursing through me, I fairly clung to the tabletop as my legs began to tremble. I closed my eyes in an attempt to reign in my still volatile mood, reciting the decimal places of pi in lieu of punching or throwing something at someone.

"John." The voice at my ear was pitched low and they tugged at my good arm, making me sit firmly in the chair that was still behind my knees, not a moment too soon as I felt them collapse beneath me. I grunted in pain as a wave rose up from the middle of my back, fire radiating out from my spine into the tense muscles of my neck and shoulders.

"Just breathe, John. It'll be okay." Virgil, —for that was who it was— placed his hands on my shoulders as I leaned forward, pillowing my head on my good arm as I attempted to quash the agony thrumming in my head, the edge only just taken off by the Tramadol I had been dosed with.

"I want to go back to sleep." I whispered. "I'm so tired." Clenching my teeth, I looked up at my father. "I'm not hungry, Dad. Can I please be excused?"

He looked at me for a second, and then clarity shone from behind his blue eyes. "Yes, John. I'll get someone to bring something into you later, just in case. Do you need a hand?"

I went to shake my head, but realising that I was just about going to have to prove my words, I nodded.

Virgil, still standing at my shoulder, held his arm out for me. As I took it with a sheepish smile, he pulled me to my feet. Figuring I'd ask my dad about the crutch at the hospital tomorrow, I muttered an apology to my family as the two of us left the dining room. I knew that once I was more at ease, I'd be able to properly say I was sorry, but for now, I was just too tired.

##

I woke up the next morning with butterflies in my stomach.

Dad had gotten Alan to bring some soup and toast into me later in the night, and I had taken the chance to assure the kid that I really wasn't mad at him; that I was just afraid of what the next few days might hold. He had grinned shyly at me, and I knew that he wouldn't slip to our brothers what I had told him of my feelings. The kid was good at keeping secrets, as long as you did the same for him in return.

Laying there in the bed with the comforting dryness of the fresh sheets that had been placed while I was eating, I resolved to myself not to think about worst-case-scenario until there was cause to worry. Pulling myself laboriously into a seated position against my pillows, I swung my legs out over the bed, sighing in relief as I managed to correctly copy the manoeuvre that Gordon had showed me yesterday.

I was just about to head to the en-suite bathroom to see if I could shower and dress on my own, when there was a knock on the closed door.

Grumbling as I grabbed at the headboard to keep my balance when I jerked in surprise, I called out. "Yeah? Come in."

Scott poked his head around the door. "You need a hand, John?"

Realising that though I really wanted to regain my independence for a short while, I probably shouldn't go doing it when there was no-one in the room. I nodded reluctantly, watching as my eldest brother crossed the room to perch on the edge of the unmade bed.

Watching me warily as I moved stiffly about the room, my brother spoke quietly. "I'll just wait here. Let me know if you need anything."

##

Did I mention that I hated hospitals? Well, that notion was re-enforced as I was wheeled by my father in the chair we had bought in London, into the waiting room of the oncology department of the St. Francis Health Center.

It brought back memories I'd have rather stayed buried within the depths of my mind. The half-hour drive it had taken my father and myself to drive from Lawrence was really too long a period, as it allowed me to dwell on the barrage of invasive and undoubtedly painful tests that I was to be undergoing throughout the day.

I had managed, amidst complaining, grumbling, and a few different sets of puppy-dog expressions, to persuade my brothers to stay at the homestead and try an approximation of relaxation in our absence. I knew that I could hardly expect them to forget what I was heading into, but I really wouldn't have been able to cope if all of them had managed to wrangle their way into coming. I was nervous enough already, without having to constantly guard my expression and feelings. I didn't want to worry my siblings too much with my mental state, especially the younger ones, who even now I considered needing to have a shield put over them to protect them against the fallibility of one of their older brothers.

We sat there, not speaking for at least forty minutes following our check-in with the front desk. I was shifting as much as a guy with a bung arm and back can, and I could see the tense set of my father's shoulders as his patience with the situation slowly dwindled. Despite the fact that he had called ahead with the importance of me being seen , there were obviously many people who also needed their needs met by the doctors at the clinic, and there was no point in getting impatient; the whole terrible game of cancer was one of waiting, anyway.

I was obviously not the only patient waiting for admittance. There were many individuals in various stages of health; a middle-aged man, still looking relatively healthy, sitting with his hands woven tightly with a brown-haired woman; and then a young girl, merely six years old, cradled in her mother's arms with a bright purple bandanna wound about her head, and the end of a PICC line taped down at the crook of her elbow. Bruises were all over her arms and neck, and I deduced that she was probably suffering from leukemia.

I guessed that looking at those particular people, I was somewhere in between them in terms of treatment; not caught early, as I assumed the man was, but not in the middle of it like the young girl. There were many others around the room; but it was those two who caught my attention. I silently wished them well with their treatment, even as my name was called by the nurse at the doorway.

Aw hell.  I sighed, as my father pushed my chair out of the room. Out of the frying pan, and into the fire… It was D-day, and I was about to watch as my worst nightmare came true.


	15. Fire and Rain, Part Two

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: If not for Sylvia and Gerry Anderson, I would not be able to play in this wonderful playground, so no; I do not own the Thunderbirds.

I tried to stop myself, but I couldn't help but flinch as we entered Dr Kingston's office. He had always been a wonderful man. At fourteen years old, when I was tired, sick and scared out of my very mind, he had squatted down to my height, for I had been tiny compared to my fellow schoolmates —  that's what you get for wanting to be eight weeks early— and had told me, very kindly, that he was going to try his best to get me well.

It wasn't that I wasn't happy to see the guy; it was always a pleasure to speak with him, and enquire about his teenage daughter, who was a mere two years younger than Alan, but I dearly wished it was only for another check-up, rather than the confirmation of my disease's return.

He hadn't changed much in the few months since I had last come in for my twice-yearly screening. Still tall and distinguished; naturally black hair more salt than pepper than the first time I had met him, his forest-green eyes were stern but kind beneath bushy brows. Gordon would most likely have likened him to one of the Muppets; not because of his behaviours, but just because he personally reminded me of Bert from Sesame Street, and I had mentioned him in that view following our first meeting. Gordon had never really watched cartoons, so I can accurately say that that was what he would have come out with, despite the incorrectness. It was Jim Henson for both of them anyway.

My father stood behind my wheelchair as we came to a stop in front of the oncologist's desk. He seemed hesitant as to whether he should stay or go. I hated to feel childish, but I signalled him to stay.

Please; I don't want to do this alone, Daddy.

A child. Young and naïve.  Even as a kid I wasn't safe. Forced to grow too fast; loss of mother, father for a while, gone. Trying to support Scotty as brother tried to raise brother, weakening despite best intentions… fading until Big Brother was left to handle it alone.

I shook my head to release myself from memories and guilt. I looked carefully at the doctor, keeping my face neutral despite the abnormality of the situation.

"Hello, John." Dr Kingston's voice was calm as he shook my left hand with his right; authoritative and concerned, for we both knew the significance of this trip. "I hear that we've got some problems."

That's what I liked about him. It was always a team mentality as we looked at my illness; him, me, my main physician; Dr Callahan, my family... Dad, Grandma, my brothers. He had always made it clear to all of us that despite the fact that it was my body doing all of the work, the rest of them were the ones who were keeping me on an even keel, keeping me focused on our goal. I knew that it would be no different this time around.

"Yes." I just nodded, handing over the file my father had given me from his satchel. "I'll say."

##

After the initial discussion of my symptoms and the report of my results between, my father, Doctor Kingston and myself, it was decided that the tests initially taken at St Thomas Hospital needed to be redone. So I had been moved away to be poked, prodded, have images taken of my bones and musculoskeletal structure, and stuck with needles; getting blood drawn for analysis and just generally turning into a human pincushion.

As usual, my small veins had made the nurses' jobs difficult, and now there were prominent, spreading purple bruises left up and down my arms as souvenirs; not to mention evidence of fresh pinpricks that matched the still-fading one from the IV in the hospital.

There had been a delay of around thirty minutes within the testing, where I had to have a local anaesthetic to remove one of the lymph nodes beneath my jaw for biopsy. I now had an aching neck to add to my already sore body; concealed beneath the gauze patch they used to cover the stitches, and a matching headache that had slowly gotten worse as the day wore on.

My father had headed out for a bit around that time —supposedly to get some lunch for the two of us, but I suspected he was also giving those at home an update on our day so far; though why they would want to hear about me being attacked by what amounted to a particularly vicious porcupine, I would never know.

Now, to make wonderful day complete, I found myself lying curled on my left side on the thin mattress of the examination table; bare from the waist up, barring the sling still supporting my dislocated shoulder and cracked collarbone, getting prepped to have a frigging humongous stainless steel stick jabbed into my spinal cavity.

Really, it was just my luck that it was called a  lumbar  puncture wasn't it? When your entire lower back is bruised as dark as the colour of an eggplant and just as tender, and your nerves in the area are literally giving you hell on earth, the last thing you really want is a draw of spinal fluid from that exact spot. So, no; at that point I was most certainly not a happy camper.

They wouldn't have usually taken the spinal tap as well, but with my relapse there was a certain risk that could arise, as nobody yet knew what level of staging I was facing; so they had wanted to ensure that no abnormal cells had moved into my bloodstream. Needless to say, that would bring in a whole other set of complications if that situation came into play.

We had done the bone marrow extraction already, with a ten-minute gap for me to get my bearings; there was just the infinitely more painful lumbar puncture to go. I had to admit, that despite the sucky situation I was in, and how awfully rude I was probably being, the orderlies were brilliant. The one doing the actual test was one of the doctors who had assisted when I was diagnosed the first time, though I hadn't realised it until I had calmed down enough to look her in the eye.

"Okay, John… This is it… just relax as much as you can for me. You might feel a bit of pressure… A slight burn…"

I couldn't help but whimper at the feeling of the oversized syringe as it slid home —punching through skin and muscle to meet the interior of the spinal column beneath. I nearly became sick then and there. I had a nurse at my feet and another at my head to prevent me from moving too much as they performed the test, and I was mortified to realise that I was trembling with the effort it took to not scream aloud.

I hate needles…. I hate needles…. I hate 'em, hate 'em, hate 'em….

I clenched my teeth and screwed my eyes shut as the sensation of the needle retracing its route made itself known. Agonisingly slowly, my overactive imagination presented me with graphic images of the procedure. There really were times when I hated my own brain. I automatically tensed as it was removed from my body, despising and loathing it with every breath that gasped from my chest, but knowing that it was ultimately, a necessary evil.

"All done, John." The nurse's gentle voice penetrated the self-induced numbing of my thoughts and I howled in the confines of my own mind. Oh thank God…

"Holy fuck." I muttered breathlessly. "That  hurt …"

Gabrielle; the forty-something red-haired woman who had done the test, thankfully ignored my cursing as the others packed up their equipment and left. She smiled gently at me. "Just sit tight and rest, John, and then after about fifteen minutes, you can head off home and rest some more."

I just closed my eyes; hoping to doze until my father came back. God was I glad for the Tramadol. If I didn't have that right now I knew that I'd be howling in agony… Rest sounded really good, as much as I would probably be protesting about not being allowed to get up soon enough.

It wasn't long before I heard the sound of my father's footsteps on the carpeted floor. I still had my eyes closed to shut out the light, but I heard him settle into the chair next to the gurney I was laying on.

"Hi Dad." I murmured, unwilling to open my eyes, not wanting to have the light encroach on the darkness I was getting used to. "How's the mob coping?"

I sensed his surprise, then resignation as he realised I had read his bearing accurately. When it came to hiding things from me or Scott, my father was anything but subtle, not for lack of trying of course.

Sighing, he spoke quietly, and I thanked him silently for knowing about the headache that I had been holding all day. "They're all fine, just worried to death about you."

Opening my eyes a crack and raising my head off of the pillow, I looked him in the eye. "I am sorry for the way I spoke last night. It wasn't fair." My voice was tight, but I could see that my father understood my sincerity well. He smiled at me.

"We understand, son. I promise, step by step we'll get through this. I swear it." In one of our rare displays of affection, he wrapped his arms awkwardly around me, and I held him tight.

##

Despite my earlier confidence in the power of pain-relievers, riding home in the car was agony. We'd left the hospital with instructions for me to stay reclined either on the couch or in bed to take the strain off of the extraction sites, and to come back in two days for the conclusion of the test results. From there we would come back to a few choices as to how to handle them, and where we would go depending on what they had shown.

I had been sitting with my head resting against the cool glass of the window —the crutch I had requested at my side— as I attempted to slip into a haze light enough to be able to ignore the thumping in my head and back. My bad arm was resting in my lap; the only part of me somewhat dull in terms of pain, when a thought suddenly barged into my mind, previously buried beneath everything else that had been spinning in my mind over the last few days.

Unwillingly, my eyes flicked open, meeting the grey light of the cloudy sky as I spoke.

"Dad. What happened with IR on Monday? Virge said that everyone was wearing helmets, but I was just wondering what we've told everyone about the situation with The Hood…"

My father glanced over at me, before he turned his eyes back to the road ahead. "We're on a temporary hiatus at the present time. Penny, Parker and a couple of our other agents are handling it all as we speak." He sighed, and I could see the tense set of his shoulders as everything pressed on him for his attention.

I resolved to keep an eye on him; he had a tendency to take everything upon himself a lot of the time. There was family, International Rescue and his work with Tracy Aeronautics for him to deal with as well. I really didn't want to see him drilling himself into the ground right now.

"We still don't know exactly what damage The Hood did to the operation as a whole. In terms of our anonymity, we're fine; no-one would believe the guy if he tried to convince someone of our identities. He's too well known as a conman for them to even consider it. There's some issues with the 'birds though. We know that 'Two's guidance processor has basically been fried, and there is some cosmetic and mechanical damage to 'One and 'Three. There's also possible damage to the silos and the house itself as well. Kyrano has told me that Tin-Tin and Fermat are helping out with the tidy-up as much as they can, but it's going to take a while to get us back online. The world's going to have to cope without IR for a while."

And then there's you.  The unspoken part of that statement was hidden there, but he knew that I would rather not have to talk about it.

The truth was, that as soon as it was ready to go, I wanted operations back online. As much as I wanted my family there with me as I fought my battle, I would much prefer the fate of thousands be changed and my family have something to do, rather than those people die and my father and siblings have too much time to fret over me.

I didn't want to broach the subject prematurely, but as far as how I would be feeling when the time came, as of now, I was thinking that maybe I would be able to monitor rescue situations from Base with Brains on hand if I tired too much. But that was weeks, if not a few months in the future, and I was just content to go home right now, and spend some time with my family, before the news that would probably shatter my world into a million, untidily arranged pieces.


	16. Fear

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: If not for Sylvia and Gerry Anderson, I would not be able to play in this wonderful playground, so no; I do not own the Thunderbirds.

Fear.

One syllable, four letters, and far too many meanings involved to count. Fear is something that affects every creature on earth in some way, whether it be fear of being hunted, killed; fear of not being able to survive, not being able to store food or to find somewhere sheltered from the seasons.

For a human, the feeling of being afraid is something that is undoubtedly a lot more complicated when we think about the emotional and mental ramifications that are dragged along the thorny trail left by the physical.

The fear of being forgotten; unaccepted, having a fear of failing. Fear of losing a loved one; of illness, pain or death. There is fear of the known, the very much unknown, and then there things that we can perhaps see, but never know well enough to understand.

It was all of those, and more that were whirring around in my head, and roiled within my intensely nauseous stomach as I woke up the morning of my follow-up appointment.

I must have been on one hell of an autopilot run, because the next thing I knew, I was fully dressed, and apparently breakfasted; seated in the shotgun seat of our, car speeding towards the Lawrence city limits with a backseat full of brothers that I really couldn't remember inviting on my personal voyage to hell.

Now that I think of it, the ride wasn't half as uncomfortable as the one I had taken home following the tests two days ago. The long hours of sleep, drugs, and the perusal of my old science-fiction novels had done well in allowing my body to get over the shock that being blasted through the air and careening headlong into solid objects had sent it into.

Yes, I was still in a painful amount of discomfort from my injuries, and my brain was still giving me random and incredibly painful migraines, but I was admittedly moving around a lot better than I had been, even the day before.

I really had Grandma to thank in part for that; the lurid pink hot water bottle that she had unearthed from her closet —despite the ribbing I had gotten from my brothers over accepting something so damn  girly —had really done wonders in calming the ache caused by the marrow and fluid extractions. I found myself seriously considering possibly kidnapping it, or even investing in one of my own in the very near future. It actually allowed me to sleep without waking up every twenty minutes with the blasts of reacting pain sensors.

We reached the hospital much faster than I really wanted. Time seemed to always have a terrible tendency of speeding up alarmingly, when all I wanted was for it to drag for an eternity and allow me to enjoy the relative state of calm, before it was shattered by the proverbial storm looming on the horizon.

##

My brothers were uncharacteristically silent as we pulled into the parking lot, leaving me with the distinct impression that they were more worried about this than they had previously let on. Alan in particular stuck close to my side, as I leaned on the crutch beneath my left arm, making my slow way towards the building.

Being a Saturday, though the clinic was open, it was also a lot quieter than it was during the week. I wasn't much bothered by the difference; it was still a hospital and the place that held the help I needed, but it was helpful in ensuring that I wouldn't find myself parked on my rump after being knocked off of my feet by some person in a rush to be somewhere.

I knew that I had peeved off my father, and both my immediate elder and younger brothers by refusing to bring the wheelchair, but I had faith in my ability to stay upright, and I had previously promised myself that I would face whatever the fates had seen fit to place on my shoulders, with my head held high; standing on my own two feet, not slouched uncomfortably in a piece of rolling metal and fabric.

I was getting a little tired though, as I reached the door of the elevator we needed to take to the third floor, so as we all trooped in, I leaned against the wall, letting it brace my back as the crutch balanced me from the side. I could see that Scott had sussed out my tactics immediately, and came to stand next to me, bumping his shoulder into my left in a silent gesture of support.

The timer dinged as we reached our stop, and I nodded in thanks to my brothers as both eldest and youngest resumed their honour guard, walking along either side of me, acting as buffers as I headed towards the truth of what was happening to my body.

Reaching the beige-painted door of the waiting room to the offices of the admin department of the hospital where I was to be meeting with Dr. Kingston, I froze as the memories of the first time I had walked through the doors of this department swept into my vision; impressions, thoughts and feelings that I had been too dazed to feel the other day choking me as they rose up in my mind's eye.

I held my father's hand tight in my own as we walked slowly towards the offices. My father had gotten a vid-phone call from Dr. Callahan early this morning, and we had been told to come to the building immediately to discuss the results of the blood tests I had undergone a few days ago.

" Dad." I whispered suddenly, dragging on the hand that was gripping his fingers hard, pulling him to a dead halt.

I didn't care that I was fourteen years old, and that I was a teenager well on his way to becoming a man. I had been feeling too ill lately and I found that it was much easier to pretend that I was a kid still and not have to worry about acting my proper age. I didn't think I would be able to stay on my feet unassisted anyway; I was too weak from the lack of appetite that had led to my rapid loss of weight, and I was basically falling asleep on my feet as it was.

"Dad. I'm scared. What if it's something really bad?" I had an uneasy feeling in my gut about today's appointment, but I had no idea on how to put it into words so I could make my father understand. As much as I was glad that my father was here with me, after being absent for so long after Mom's death, I wished strongly for my elder brother to be here as well; he would know how to explain my feelings to our dad, make him understand exactly what I was trying to say with my fumbling words.

But Scott was at home with Grandma and the younger boys; only just allowed out of bed during the day, and he thus spent the majority of his time on the couch in the family room, sleeping, reading, or playing board-games with Virge and me while Dad worked in his office, and Grandma took Gordy and Al to the movies or the zoo to keep them from disturbing the still-recovering seventeen-year-old. Even those few activities tired him out after a short while. So no, Scott coming with me today just wasn't possible.

Hearing the tired, scared tone in my quiet voice, my dad turned to face me straight; folding his six foot frame in half as he bent down to look me squarely in the eyes with his own, dark blue ones. I shifted awkwardly as we forced people to part around us in the busy hallway, but my father didn't seem to care if we were blocking the way. "It'll be alright, John. I'm thinking that you've most likely just got what Scott's had. You'll be very tired, but Dr. Callahan will give us some antibiotics for you, and we'll be okay."

I still wasn't sure though. "But Dad…" I argued weakly. "I don't just feel exhausted; I feel  sick . My bones ache, and I've always got a headache. And Scott had a sore throat and everything. I know that I don't have a cold or strep."

I could see the worry in my father's eyes as it flashed through his carefully constructed mask, as he rose to his full height. He gripped my shoulder reassuringly though, as I forced myself to walk with him, shaking like a leaf in a gale as we entered the waiting room, just as the attending nurse called out the next name. "John Tracy?"

I hesitantly stepped forward beside my father, emotions swirling sickeningly in my chest. Fear, worry, panic; all terrible feelings that I had only had known only once before in my short life, and that was ten months ago, just before Dad had told us that Mom was dead and she wouldn't be coming home. I knew somehow, then, that I didn't have mono. It was something much bigger, and much more terrifying. And the bluntness in my own heart about the truth of the matter only made the feeling stronger.

"John." Snapping out of the memories of my past, my eyes flickered to meet Scott's troubled gaze, noting as always, the similarities between both the faces of my father and eldest brother. "You okay?"

I nodded tiredly, my eyes meeting my father's now, and I recognized the look in them as matching the one that he had worn coming up to, and following the appointment eight years ago that had torn my life into pieces.

I continued forwards, the open doors to the waiting room leaving me thinking obscenely of the gates to Hell. I supposed absently that my theory wasn't that far off, but there was also the fact that it could be looked at the opposite way as well; as the gates to a place that represented a road that led to absolution and recovery, for I knew that many people who went through these doors did reemerge from them cured, or as close to having a normal life as possible. I only hoped that I would be given a third chance at my life.

Like a few days before, we had to wait a bit before I was called into the office, but this time I was the only patient waiting. My father, my brothers and I sat tensely in the room; bleached white wall above the receptionist's counter giving me the beginnings of a headache, as I stared wide-eyed at it in an attempt to calm my breathing. It really wouldn't be a good thing to panic, when I didn't exactly know what I was panicking about just yet.

Perhaps because it was out of my current range of abilities, rather than pacing unevenly across the floor, I contented myself with picking rather savagely at the lining of the sling that still encased my arm. At the point where Dr. Kingston's assistant called my name out, I had basically unraveled a good part of the blue cotton stitching, a large web of thread entangled in the fingers of my left hand, a slit in the doubled-up loop of material that was very noticeable, even if one wasn't paying attention. Not that I really cared.

All four of my brothers, plus my father rose immediately as my name was called. I felt their gazes on my back as I struggled to my feet on my own, and I silently thanked them for their non-help. Once I felt steady, I turned, and began another trek down the long hallway that led to my doctor's office.

I found myself two minutes later facing Dr. Kingston across his desk, the manila envelope holding my results taunting me with its cheery yellow color; it reminded me oddly of Thunderbird Four, though I could hardly have said it in present company, even if I wished to look like a fool.

My father sat in the chair next to me; my brothers spread out in various positions behind me, either in chairs or along the back wall. I felt sorry for the older man; just being the bearer of bad news was probably earning him a multitude of steely-eyed gazes from every single one of them.

I gave him a weak smile, and quickly turned away from the illuminated board above the exam table that would soon be displaying the results of my scans, like some depraved artist's exhibition. I had to smirk at that. I could only imagine what Virgil would have to say about that observation.

Once Dr. Kingston had shaken the hands of myself, my father, and all of my brothers, he sat down in his chair with a sigh, looking me straight in the eye, even as he picked up the folder that held my sentence between its edges.

"Okay, John." He blew a breath from between his teeth as he peered at the first page. "Here's what we're dealing with here. What you have exactly is  Relapsed Diffuse Large B-cell Lymphoma . It is exactly the same subtype that you had last time, though fortunately, we have caught it a lot earlier this time around." I sighed in a measure of relief, but then heard the unspoken 'but' present on the end of the sentence. A flare of worry started up in my stomach. The doctor continued.

"However, due to the fact that this is a recurring case we are dealing with, rather than a first-time diagnosis, the cancer is that much more fast-growing, and that has been proven by the fact that your symptoms came on in a matter of weeks, rather than months. This means that should you choose treatment, John, the treatments that will be involved are going to be stronger, longer in duration, and much more taxing on the health of your body."

There was a split second's pause, and then; "What?"

My head turned so fast, I thought I must have gotten whiplash.

Scott stood straight as a poker in the middle of the room; violet-spattered sapphire eyes blazing with anger, and his whole body vibrating with the effort of staying still. "What do you mean,  if  he does treatment?" He was facing the doctor, but the unbridled rage in his voice, mixed with a measure of hurt, was for me alone. My younger brothers had similar looks of shock on their faces, staring at me as Dr. Kingston's words registered.

Abruptly angered at Scott's immediate judgment of me, I spoke up harshly, cutting sharply through each word.

"Exactly what it means, Scott.  If I choose to do the treatment." My father laid his hand on my good shoulder reassuringly. We had discussed this privately, many times before.

"I made the decision a while ago that if it ever happened that the cancer returned, and it appeared to be too bad for treatment to give me much hope, I wouldn't go through the chemo and everything if there wasn't a clear chance that I would survive it.' I shrugged. Like it wasn't a big deal.

'I need to know what the extent of it is before I make a decision; the staging, how complex it is, and my overall chances." Turning my back on my gobsmacked, wide-eyed brothers, I felt a flash of guilt at the way they had found out, but nevertheless, I nodded at the good doctor to continue.

The room was silent as we waited for the crunch.


	17. Decisions

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As usual, if it wasn't for my creators; Sylvia and Gerry Anderson, Pyre would not be able to play in the wonderful playground she's discovered, so no; she still states that she does not own the Thunderbirds. And as she is clearly only a university student, in education and not medicine, she maintains that all or any medical information found within was found on the web.

It's funny the way a person reacts to extremely or even moderately stressful situations. The heart beats twice, or even thrice its normal pace; thumping away like a steam locomotive as it thunders the blood and oxygen around your body. Your palms go sweaty and you can't grip onto anything, breaths come in ever faster pants of frantic inhalations of air. Your eyes glaze over with a greyish haze, and your whole world narrows to the tiniest pinprick of information that sent you spinning into oblivion in the first place.

My brain was literally and figuratively getting fried as I waited for that agonisingly long split-second to pass; though I tried to ignore the searing, white-hot thoughts that were rocketing their way around my mind like it was their own personal playground, taking no prisoners where anything even remotely related to normality was concerned.

It left me with nothing more than a vague sense of attention to my impending doom. Great… As if I hadn't had enough panic attacks over the past week… Blasting headache, spine and entire body ache aside, I really wanted to tell the world to screw itself for sticking me in this again. And the doctor hadn't even begun speaking yet.

I gripped tightly to the side of my seat, inordinately pissed off at the fact that my crawling, throbbing, useless right arm couldn't assist my hand in joining in with its partner; my mauling of the sling seemed completely a waste of my time and attention now, when I realised how immensely satisfying it was to see the way that the flimsy plastic arm of the desk chair yielded without protest to the determined digging of my fingernails; sending fascinating curls of creamy molecular structure arching away from my scraggy fingertips.

Screw Mother Nature for letting humans be so damned fragile. Nothing on earth, except maybe the powers of its own geological forces would ever be strong enough to thwart the will of the cosmos; especially not a tiny little tin-can like Thunderbird Five. My fingernails are amusingly determined when they want to be. Either that or my body had finally decided to buck up, get stronger and take it like a man. I snorted to myself. I really needed another hobby, something not involved with the examination of fate and coincidence.

Goddammit. Why was this guy taking so damn long to spit out a few simple words?

Another of the stupider defence mechanisms of the human body; the ability of the mind to zap itself out of the conversation or situation without letting the person involved be any the wiser. The runaway thoughts of a stricken person are equal in force to only that of an atomic explosion when they are interrupted by the thing that they would rather not face. Helpful when in pain, exhaustingly tired, and when your ship is in danger of blowing into many jagged pieces about you, but definitely not when you need to know something that is vital to your very survival.

Nuclear reactions are interesting to behold.

"John?"

"WHAT?" Blue-violet eyes stared at me as I blew my frustrations from the last few days into the atmosphere like so many noxious gas clouds. Like a nuclear extraction plant, my fuse blew me sky-high from just a simple little nudge from a brightened spark, much to my shock and surprise.

I had thought that I had worked all of this out of my system by now. I'd had way too much time to think on everything that had happened to our family. The days spent with them, though mostly pain and sleep-filled should have taken care of any lingering, niggling worries that might have been present since the fall of my 'Bird, without me realising. But no; I had go on straight and blow up in another brother's face when it was clear that my brain couldn't be fucked staying calm and thinking things through rationally. I just had to go and blow a gasket again, didn't I?

My brother powered on, well and truly aware that the emotions roiling in my gut were toxic. He knew me too well to presume that it was just simple panic talking. From the way that I had reacted, I could read it in his eyes that he knew that it was all of the possible scenarios that I knew could eventuate; loss of kidney function; pancreatitis… permanent immune suppression, diabetes; even if I were to survive a second bout with poisons that were just barely classed as medicinal drugs.

He continued cautiously nevertheless, treading through a minefield that was so littered with eggshells and scattered, panicked thoughts that I was sure that I couldn't see the floor anymore, even if I tried. "Are you alright John?"

A stupid question, but a fair one, I had to admit, not that I fully recognised it for what it was in the first place.

"Huh?" I seemed to have regressed back to one-word grunts. For a supposedly well-spoken man, fluent in over five languages and half-proficient in a further three, I really needed to get my brain reconnected with my mouth…

Effective immediately, Roger, affirmative, F.A.B …thanks ever so much; I'd like an answer  now , if you please!

I really had to give Scotty-boy credit. There was no way in hell, after the past almost-week we had endured, that even with the endless patience I usually had, that I could still be half as calm as my brother was right now, especially with how volatile our two tempers were when combined.

"The treatment options." My brother was puzzled, mixing with concern on his pointed, angular face that Virgil with him, shared from our mother, to convince me that I had most certainly missed something while caught up in my thought-tornado.

"You were listening to what the doctor said about the staging, and what you can expect…. Yeah?" He paused, considering something briefly. Then, "I can't remember; that's your job… "

Another pause, and then the half-assed attempt at a joke that poked fun at my almost unnatural ability to remember entire conversations, inflections and all kinds of different ways it could have been altered to sound better, was ignored in favour of dropping my jaw in a very obvious expression of complete and utter shock.

I shook my head slowly, my world expanding from the pair of violet-hued blue eyes in front of me to encompass the room at large.

My dad was still next to me, frowning at me in all-out fatherly concern; Scott was squatted in front of me, leaning against the arms of the chair as he stared at my face, having a pretty good go at reading my thoughts. My younger brothers I couldn't see, as I was still facing totally away from them, but I could clearly envision the looks —quite identical to Scott's I would imagine— that would be on their faces if they were in my line of sight.

Damn it. I needed to rewire my brain to actually resume taking in entire conversations, communications and intel; the computer hard drive up top had clearly been majorly scrambled since the main generator had collapsed.

Okay. Step one; focus. Step two; cope with the consequences, and plan for alternatives. Step Three; make a goddamned decision and hope to hell you survive, Sparky.

The reassuring emergence of the old adage that my dad had pep-talked and drilled into us our entire lives, was what assisted me in keeping my new-found handle on my emotions; my father's old nickname for me parking my determination back where it belonged, and showing me that  I sure as hell can do this if I wanted.

Dr. Kingston, having been watching the one-sided conversation between myself and my eldest brother with interest, spoke then, almost-but-not-quite derailing my sudden determination to stay focused on my goal. It reminded me that there was actually something to be afraid of, though ignoring it and hoping that it would soon go away was probably not the best way to handle the situation. Stupid brain.

"Maybe the rest of you should go. You've already heard it once… Let me speak to John alone, and then maybe we can reconvene and decide what our plan of action should be." His tone was advising, calm, and I could really, truly see the merits to his idea, but I wasn't having it. Not alone.

Scott, sensing with that implacable Big Brother thing (that all of us but Alan have going at sometimes-strength, but always turned-up-to-the-highest setting with him), saw my look of discomfort and shook his head. My father did too, noticing the sideways expression that my brother was throwing him.

Not without Scotty this time. No. I wanted both the elder members of my family with me. For them to hold me while I fell in a bedraggled heap, before I was to pull myself up and get the engines running again at full speed ahead. Just once, I wanted to be a kid again.

"Boys." My father's voice was not quite Commander-level at the moment, but all the same it was enough that I was just about ready to hop to attention. It was a testament to just how stressed he truly was that he didn't dial down his tone enough to resemble something more casual. When my father was stressed, like Scott, he went somewhat military. "Head to the café downstairs and I'll call you when we're ready for you to head back."

I turned in my chair then, for the first time; curiosity about exactly how my younger brothers were going to take  that particular order a welcome delay for the inevitable.

Predictably, both Alan and Gordon wore similar looks of mulish indignation; memories stirring in my mind from how many times in the past I had seen them use their combined power to bring their adversaries to their knees, even if it was only the escape from punishment for their collaborative pranks.

Virgil had pulled out his time-perfected 'kicked-puppy-doe-eyed' look. It was helpful many times in getting him hell outta dodge when it seemed as though he might be implicated in either involvement with a misdemeanour, or plead out of something that he really didn't want to do, like clean the car or sweep the yard with the use of the old 'I feel sick' plug. The thing was though, he had ultimately forgotten that that particular trick had never worked on Scott, much less me. He had managed to dupe Dad into believing him from time to time, however.

When I made no indication of hearing their wordless pleas for mercy, our father made shooing motions with his hands, overriding the immediate protests of 'I wanna stay!' (Gordon); 'That's not fair, Scott gets to stay!' (Alan); or Virgil's silent look of absolute betrayal ' Hey! I'm older than them, why can't I?'  Then the door closed, and all was silent.

The doctor spoke again, endlessly patient as he had waited for the various family spats to sort themselves out. Scott had made himself comfortable, hiking his lanky frame up onto the examination table along the wall, close enough for reassurance, but not too close for comfort to be sacrificed. My father sat almost side-on to Dr. Kingston, having heard it for the first time already, he was obviously determined to keep his attention on me for any change to my countenance that could be construed as worrying to his mind.

"Alrighty John. You with me this time?" Dr. Kingston's voice was filled with warmth, and I instantly relaxed, freak out in the past, but not completely forgotten. I nodded mutely, as I waved for him to continue, pretending for their sake, that the last ten minutes hadn't actually happened.

"Basically, where you're at is around Stage 2B, because with the tests we discovered the presence of infected lymphocytes within the node we removed from beneath your jaw. I'm saying that you are just before the point of being termed a stage-three relapse, due to the jaw node, and also the beginning of a cluster of tumours forming beneath your right arm, and throughout the chest cavity on the same side, as shown from the PET scan we performed on Wednesday."

Dr. Kingston pointed to the wall above Scott's head, towards a series of images on the light-board that I hadn't noticed before, the first one being the subject of his sentence. Squinting closely up at it —I hadn't thought to bring my spare pair of reading glasses— I saw that there was a scattered whitish area both below the aforementioned arm, as well as speckled lightly across my shoulder.

"The blood tests and the MRI confirmed it, as did the presence of your fever, and the night-sweats and loss of appetite you described to me at our last appointment." He paused to ensure that I was still with the conversation, before switching to the topic I was both anxious and dreading hearing about.

"In terms of treatability, John, despite the relative proximity to your cardiac and respiratory organs, there is every indicator that you will survive if you decide on taking the treatment. Even though there is a large risk involved when we take into account the high malignancy of these tumours, and the strength of the rounds of chemotherapy and radiation you will need to take to combat them, as usual the overall probability of you being able to survive it is obviously greater than if you do not take the medications. The choice is merely up to you."

I sat in the chair, with the eyes of my father and Scott upon me, put on the spot as I tried to get my mouth to form the words to the question I wanted to ask. I was on the verge of screaming when my mind finally decided to give me back the ability to speak.

"What are my chances?" I asked apprehensively, taking a breath in anticipation. "With and without treatment?" I needed to ask, to enable myself to make an informed decision on whether I wanted to die confined to bed and vomiting my guts out, or slowly weakening from the inside out; symptoms repressed by medication pumped liberally into my veins just as much as I would be getting from the chemo. Inwardly, I shuddered at the thought of what was going to be coming my way soon enough. That and the needles it would involve.  Ew.

"Thirty-three per-cent without, fifty-seven per-cent with treatment." Dr. Kingston spoke softly but firmly, and I found myself wondering incredulously how in hell they'd managed to come up with those precise odds.

"In terms of the regimen we would be looking at if we were going ahead with the treatment, the tentative plan would be to have you three weeks on the chemotherapy, take one week off, and then one week on the radiation treatment along with the immunotherapy, in a six-hours on, eighteen off system within that three-week period to give your body a rest, keeping an eye on your vitals and monitoring your system in between. The cycles will then repeat as we span them out over approximately three months.'

'At the end of that stage of the treatment, we'll take the full barrage of tests again, and see what the next step will be." He was crisp, sharp and precise with the information, leaving clearly cut facts with a specific goal in mind, and I found that it was that more than anything that calmed me enough to respond.

"And then?" I prompted, swallowing heavily as I attempted to compose myself, and I felt two different hands grip my shoulders, lending silent support as I waited.

"The next step would be to look for a suitable match for an allogenic stem-cell transplant, and also a marrow transplant, the decision whether that would be from your own body, or from a donor will depend on the overall state of your red and white blood cell counts." Dr. Kingston's voice was hard then, and I knew that he was taking this with as much difficulty as my family. Despite the fact that we had a relationship as doctor and patient, there was an emotional attachment to each other as well, we had become friends of a sort over the years he had been seeing me for my treatments and appointments. "I would want to place you on the list immediately in order to have you get the greatest chance of getting a donor should the need arise."

My father spoke up then, his voice hard with suppressed worry and stress, and I felt his hand tighten along with Scott's as he spoke. "Is it possible for us to get tested for a match for John? I know that we were discussing the possibility of having to look for a donor last time…" he trailed off. I looked at him in surprise. I knew it had been bad last time, but not by that much…

The doctor nodded. "Yes, if it so happens that the initial treatment doesn't have any affect, we would have no problems if the family wishes to be tested."

Scott looked at me then, from where he was standing next to my chair, and he nodded a companionate affirmative to my father's understanding nod. I knew that he was saying.  You have to take the treatment road, we're all gonna be there rooting for you, and we'll give you a part of us; so say yes, Bud or so help me I'll chuck you outta an airlock next chance I get.

I frowned and grinned simultaneously; wasn't this  my  choice? But then I contemplated my brother's meaning as both my doctor and father watched me carefully.

In hindsight, considering my decision in light of knowing that I would almost certainly die if the treatments didn't work, and definitely would without, there was really no way that I could walk away from the chance I had been offered. I thought of my brothers; how I knew that they would be pushing to be first in line to assist me, and I knew that there was no way I could force them to watch as I slowly faded away.

I looked up again, and I felt fierce stubbornness, determination and sheer Tracy pigheadedness rise within me, strong and deep-rooted, inherited from generations of Tracy males since we had settled in Kansas decades ago. I would see this to the end, if only to beat the bloody damn odds yet again, as I had almost nine years ago.

Three simple words, but they would hold the fears of my family, and most of all; my own at bay. Three simple words, but they held the power of life in their meaning.

"I'll do it."


	18. Contingencies and Certainties

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: If not for Sylvia and Gerry Anderson, I would not be able to play in this wonderful playground, so no; I do not own the Thunderbirds.  
> The medical information found within may not be correct, however this is a work of fiction, so any mistakes can be blamed on creative license.

The relief within the air was so strong I could almost taste it. Shoulders relaxed slightly as the words left my mouth, though there was still deep-set stress buried within both Scott and Dad's bearings. It was much less marked though, as an important worry was erased from their radar.

Almost in defiance, tension curled its way into an ever-tightening snarl into the pit of my stomach, intensifying so much that the knot of worry and despair was making me feel physically ill. I decided right then that I would ignore what I knew what was going to be discussed next until it was up smack-bang,  you-can't-ignore-me-now right goddamn there staring me in the eyes. Not until I was ready to face it this time; no more minds going AWOL on my watch.

Rubbing my good shoulder firmly in that weird, out of the norm comfort thing that I really wasn't used to, my father used his other hand to dial with his work-phone the cell that I knew that Virgil had in the pocket of the old, faded blue Levis that he'd pulled on as we'd dragged him out of bed.

Though we all had pretty much unlimited access to the vid-phones that were secured to the wireless network on the island, we all had people who we preferred to contact on private lines; hence each person owning their own mobile device. My cell, one of those old brick-like things that Alan was hell-bent on calling an 'unreliable, clunky, oversized crap of a concrete block'—which I had enhanced and altered to within an inch of its life— was undoubtedly either buried somewhere within the mangled remains of what had been my sleeping quarters up on poor doomed 'Five. That or it was otherwise lost in the infinite reaches of the constellation-spattered heavens.

It was amazing the kind of reception I had gotten out there, without the myriad of different world-wide telecommunications companies clogging up the place, and all of that lovely, wonderfully deadly cosmic radiation and electro-magnetic power, it was pretty much me and a perpetually clear line to anywhere in the world that I wanted to contact.

I spent the time between my father's call and the return of my younger brothers locked into a kind of silent conversation with my brother. It was mostly Scott using an obscure sort of unidentified sign-language in an attempt to try and convince me that everything and everyone was just peachy; that we'd all be fine if we ignored the ramifications of what was going to happen to our family.

I was especially worried now, as not only had our home been invaded by a son-of-a-bitch murderous-psychotic jackass, but we were all exhausted and extremely stressed, despite the few days' 'decompression' we'd had. And then there was the fact that home probably wouldn't feel like home again, even when we finally were able to get back there and had the chance to be safe, together and whole.

Hell, I wouldn't even be surprised if my father managed to finagle Grandma into coming home with us, because honestly, if The Hood knew that Dad was the chief of International Rescue, what was stopping him and whatever remaining members of his evil-minion squad from knowing that his mother, Ruth Tracy, lived alone in a Lawrence farmhouse? True, my grandmother could well and truly look after herself, but really; what kind of sons and grandsons would we be if we weren't concerned about our parents and grandparents respectively? My God, my father with his thrice-damned ' I'm fine; I'll be here for you boys, even when I've been up for thirty-six hours and I've had too much coffee'  approach was making me worry enough right now without me having to try and suppress my worries about Grandma on top of it.

It made me wonder, once we were on a planned road with this hell-and-high water journey I was undertaking, when my father and brothers, —and the Kyranos and Hackenbackers for that matter— were going to reach their breaking points. God knew that I had seen enough of mine to last me a lifetime.

I  had  been zoning in and out of dozy-land with the awesome mixture of Tramadol, codeine as well as all of the ibuprofen and aspirin I had managed to sneak past Virgil and Dad over the last few days, but I knew that aside from the scorching tirade I had let rip the other night at dinner, I was pretty sure that I was the only one who had actually blown up. The tension and stress from the situation and resulting and synonymous events from The Hood's attack weren't anywhere even past base-camp on the mountainous trek to overcoming the almost-dying and the earth-shattering revelations that had already once brought our family to the brink of collapse.

They had been talking about me and my problems rather extensively, I had noticed. Though I was admittedly not as alert as I usually was, there was no hiding the way that they had all changed their attitudes and behaviours towards me since my explosion. I knew that they hadn't paid anywhere near the level of attention to themselves that they should have. How they'd thought I wouldn't notice, I would never know.

As children, each of us boys were immediately thought to have been of above-average intelligence; quick studies and highly logical thinkers with gifts that were specialised in varying areas, and that was it. But the true reality of it was that all of us brothers, even tiny, toddler Alan, were all the holders of IQ levels well over the average range for our respective age groups, and all our fellows knew that the Tracy boys were unequivocally highly intelligent and without much effort, the tops of the year.

But unlike my brothers, who could quite well melt into the general population of school students, comfortably able to downplay their talents, but still do astonishingly well on tests and end of year exams without much trouble past the playful ribbing from classmates, I was well and truly levelled as a genius, and basically a social outcast from the get-go.

Cripplingly shy as a child, with awkward mannerisms and overly active brain that had way too much theory, scientific and alphanumerical calculations tumbling within it, my smarts prevented me from being able to adequately communicate at a level that others besides my father and brothers could understand. Then, because everything that came out of my mouth was too mature and insightful for adults to comprehend coming from a kid, and the strange stares I earned due to my use of language that was much too complicated for many of my classmates to understand, I spent much of my time until I was thirteen years old with my mouth firmly closed.

I had been secure in the company of my elder brother rather than with those of my own age in the hope that my brilliance would go unnoticed by the world. There were times however, where my brother wasn't in reach of an arm for support socially, and I had to cope on my own. Let's just say that it didn't exactly end well the majority of the time.

I was already taking sophomore-level classes on the sly over my father's computer by the time I was in sixth grade; mostly in physics and biochemistry by correspondence, but I spent the majority of my seventh-grade exploring the possibility of creating a computer that could become a friend that wouldn't judge me, and let me converse with someone as technologically inclined and as intrigued by the world of the atom and molecular morphology of space and time as deeply as I was. That little eleven-year-old's experiment interestingly enough, was later added into the fabric of the plans that was to become Thunderbird Five's most fundamental binary and algorithmic structure.

It was because of the periods I spent ensconced in my room or the school library, with only my laptop and my textbooks for company that I developed my passion for technological communications. Troubled by the fact that I couldn't speak face-to-face with any person outside of my family without clamming up and going beet red with mortification, I found myself trying to find a way to combat that, and trying at the same time to communicate with people without having to resort to technology to do something for me that should have been second-nature.

Just before our mother's death, when I was thirteen-and-a-half, it was decided by my parents that I was to be skipped forward a few grades. I found myself suddenly sharing advanced technology and literature classes with Scott, who aside from being a little disconcerted at the unearthing of what probably seemed to him as being something immensely different and strange from a sibling who generally kept everything to himself, my brother seemed otherwise glad that I seemed to be interested in something, rather than irreparably bored out of my mind and afraid of my own shadow.

It had taken all of the intervening almost-ten years between then and now to train myself to speak in a way that the majority of humankind could understand. My father and brothers, having lived with me my entire life, were relatively capable of deciphering my 'John-ese' as Gordon had once called it, but it wasn't until I became enrolled at Harvard University when I was almost sixteen —despite having just gone into remission— just as Scott was graduating to head to Yale, that I had managed to train myself both into the art of dumbing-down, and been able to coax myself out of the cast-iron shell I had been protecting myself with.

My brothers were not much different to me in the way that we refused to show that we were hurting in both heart and mind.

Though it would very much be like the time when I'd had had six-year-old Virgil firmly convinced that I was qualified to pull out his supposedly loose tooth with Dad's rusty pliers, (much harder than it needed to be) I knew that I needed to get us talking as a family, and  soon.

I was distracted from my musings by the return of my three younger brothers; silent, anticipatory, and more than a scant bit of worry shared between their expressions. I couldn't wait for them to try asking me themselves, couldn't make myself watch any further the array of wary, worried and apprehensive looks that I was being given, so I gave them a wan smile, and nodded calmly. "It's alright guys, I'm getting the treatment."

Their smiles of relief and undisguised joy were a soothing balm to the rising apprehension; for as I sat there waiting for Dr. Kingston to resume speaking, I inched closer and closer to the beginning of ghastly illness, deep-rooted pain, and the tenuous battle that was about to commence for my life.

Once Alan, Gordon and Virgil and had made themselves comfortable in their previous positions throughout the room, the doctor looked up from the quick consult of his computer screen, and looked at me levelly, elbows on the edge of the desk, steepled fingers resting against his lower lip as he contemplated how he was going to speak.

"Alright. This first step is called salvage therapy, and basically the aim of it is to try and reach a state of remission without the need for further treatments. As you are a relapsed b-cell lymphoma, John, the treatment route I intend for us to undertake is called the rituximab-EPOCH regimen. It is similar to the initial course, but the strength and duration of the treatment of it, as I said before, will be more taxing on your health.'

'I won't go into all of it now, but I'll send home a couple of pamphlets with you if you were interested on reading up on them, but I would recommend that you don't dwell on the medications themselves, but on what we would like them to do within your body."

I nodded mutely, handing the papers that he passed to me to my father, who I watched from the corner of my eye as he tucked them into the folder that contained all of my medical information, laying it once again to the side. I pushed the apprehension over the medications down, in favour of asking something that had been weighing on my mind rather heavily.

"Is there any chance of being able to get someone to come out to the island for the treatments? I'd rather be closer to home; we have extended family living with us, and my father's friend, Hiram Hackenbacker is a registered medical professional." I knew that I was taking a risk, mentioning that without my father's prior approval, when one took into account the relative chaos that was currently reigning within our family and on the island, especially as the evidence of the last few days was probably still starkly noticeable right now. The thing was though, that I truly wanted to be on my home turf while doing this, and though I was going through the polite channels, I wasn't going to let a little thing like distance stop me from achieving it.

I saw my father's nod; though slightly disapproving it was supportive nonetheless, as I watched Dr Kingston deliberate. Slowly, he nodded.

"I will not hesitate to say that I would advise that you be closer to the center in the event that something should change with your status John, but from your words, it is clear that you held this Mr Hackenbacker in high regard. I do wish to speak with him fairly soon, in both a personal and professional capacity; but at this time, I cannot foresee that there would be any problem with that arrangement. I would like to have the allowance to come to your home myself and monitor your progress between appointments. This is a very delicate position we are in at the moment.'

My father nodded then, smiling reassuringly at the doctor, and I sensed that he had already rapidly formed a plan of action, based merely on the single query I had made. I grinned to myself. Jeff Tracy was nothing if not a man of action. "I can easily arrange for transport to and from the island, free of charge," He looked seriously at the man. "only if you are sure that it is advisable though, considering John's health."

Dr. Kingston nodded decisively. "That will be fine, I only wish there to be action taken if it seems that the travelling to and from each infusion appointment will be taking an undue toll on John's body, that you would consider staying closer to Topeka."

I nodded, but I promised myself that barring a situation that required hospitalisation, I was determined to stay where my family was, and that included the Kyranos and the Hackenbackers, in the most familiar setting possible.

The doctor, sensing that I was waiting rather apprehensively and almost dreading the last bit of information, along with my brothers and father; with their breaths held as they stood behind and beside me —both literally and figuratively— continued. The silence was heavy, threaded with tension, fear, but also the undeniable relief that something was being done to begin to repair the damage that my body was doing to itself.

"Due to the nature of your disease, John, I would like to insert your central line tomorrow, and barring any unforeseen complications, I intend for your first round of the chemotherapy to begin a few hours following that. It is not ideal for us to wait any longer than necessary, due to the high-grade reading; I am unsure how fast this may continue to spread."

I gulped audibly at that, and a number of firm hands found my shoulder. Those words were yet another jolting reminder that I was rapidly deteriorating, and that I was as sure as hell going to get much worse before there was any chance of me being able to begin even thinking about getting better.

Tomorrow was going to be difficult.


	19. I Don't

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: If not for Sylvia and Gerry Anderson, I would not be able to play in this wonderful playground, so no, I do not own the Thunderbirds.  
> As always, I do not claim to be a doctor or a medical professional of any kind; any discrepancies in detail are my own fault.

I hate waking up.

Alarm clocks suck on the most basic level; blaring, loud and just damn jolting when the sound intrudes on your ears. They never shut off the first time you whack at them because you can't find the snoozer, until you lose patience completely and lob it at the nearest wall.

However, decking the alarm clock generally isn't the best idea when it's your little brother who is oh-so-unpleasantly attempting to draw you back to the world of the wakened. The only reason I have an audio torture device on board Thunderbird Five was because —though I didn't particularly like lazing about— if my body was allowed, I would most likely remain comatose in my bed until well after noon unless somebody or something served to wake me in the interim.

Virgil's was voice pitched low in consideration, because really; despite the fact that I'm anywhere near as grouchy as he is in the morning, it still proves exceedingly difficult to draw me out of bed at the best of times, and even then, I'm not very receptive to people talking to me before food and sugar-drenched white coffee.

"Go 'way Virge…" I muttered thickly, resolutely burying my head deeper within the cosy-warm gap created by the mattress and pillows; unwilling to wake much further and face what my body had in store for me today. There was also the fact that after almost six nights of discomfort, I had finally discovered a position that allowed me to sleep somewhat comfortably.

I was laying half on my stomach and half on my good side; my left arm lost somewhere down within the tangled pile of pillows that I had amassed against the wall. My sling-covered right arm was propped securely, tight against my chest. I was quite surprised that my brother had even been able to find me in the first place, if a person was to go by the sheer amount of blankets I had collected upon discovery of a chilly bedroom the night before. To me, this was another firmly convincing reason to stay in bed.

Despite the fact that it was supposed to be coming up to summer, mornings in Lawrence still tended to pull up right fog-your-breath-teeth-chattering-chilly well into June.

I had let out a sigh of sleep-muzzled warmth, so content in the comfortable nest I'd created that I had almost forgotten about my brother and his mission, at least until there was a finger prodding almost curiously into the top of my head, as though it was unsure of what the result may be if it were to press any harder. However, far from supplying me with any motivation to make me even consider wanting to get out of bed, it only served to make me grope blindly for the edge of the top-most blanket and draw it up over the only part of me that was exposed to the air.

With a sharp yank, the weight of the covers atop me suddenly lessened substantially; the heavy red and blue afghan sliding off of the bed, landing with a muffled  flump on the floor. I was positive that the guy would've taken every single one, if not for the fact that my clutching fingers had managed to snag the remaining blankets, clinging to them with iron intensity.

"Heyyy!" I whined grumpily, wrenching my eyes open for the first time to glare at Virgil; his curly head tousled, still in his sleep-shirt and flannelette pyjama bottoms, pointed face alight with Gordon-like mischief. My look of indignant outrage was somewhat marred by the fact that the gap in the curtains were mocking me; spitefully spearing shards of white, cloud-sharpened morning light right into my retinas. My brother's image only lasted that split-second before I had jammed my eyes shut again and re-buried my face in the pillows.

Once more for luck then….

"Five more minutes…?" I mumbled half-heartedly to the pillow-case, inhaling the still-lingering scent of my grandmother's laundry soap, feeling simultaneously annoyed and resigned as my logical thinking kicked in. My mind was beginning to wake up a bit, and coming around to the reasons why I needed to get up, and the order in which I should execute the following steps.

"No can-do, Johnny-boy." Virgil told me cheerfully, and I could hear the half-regret-half-amusement that he felt from the situation in his voice. "Dad said to rise-and-shine, and we know how much he likes orders to be obeyed."

Okay, so no dice. It was worth a try though…

My brother snickered as I muttered something entirely incoherent, and raised his eyebrows. "What was that John? I can't hear you… Speak a little louder? I can always take another blanket… make it easier…"

"Get your own blanket, Pinky…" The words left my mouth without any permission whatsoever. My brother's face reddened, with anger and long-remembered embarrassment jockeying for dominance as the main expression, and I felt an immediate flash of guilt. Just because I was slightly awake, it didn't exactly mean that I was necessarily paying attention to what was coming out of my mouth.

It was only supposed to have been one of Gordon's milder pranks, but fuschia hair-dye, the first day of Virgil's junior year, and a devious younger brother had ensured that Virgil Grissom Tracy was one very unhappy guy. It had taken over a fortnight for the supposedly 'temporary' colouring to fade from Virgil's sandy-chestnut locks, and it was plenty long enough for his friends to christen him 'Pinky', which had stuck just as well as superglue. My second brother had endured the name with a resigned sort of good grace, but there  was a line between friendly teasing and that of borderline spite, and one of his so-called friends had taken it too far; making some less-than-subtle jabs at my brother's sexuality, as well as his name, which had always been a bit of a hindrance to him, thanks to some particularly nasty and obvious alterations.

It really was a pretty sad state of affairs when you use a name that a brother so intensely dislikes, and then take more than a few seconds to apologise for it, even if you are still sleep-muddled and somewhat annoyed at the fact that you're supposed to be dragging your scrawny butt out of bed.

He just shook his head a bit at me, seemingly in a forgiving mood, and brightened considerably when I gave a slight huff in anticipation and began to shuffle my way out of my cocoon.

"Alright." I told him, my mouth dry and thick from a night's lack of moisture, my tired eyes gritty with sleep-dust, as I pulled myself into a seated position. "Leave me to dress, and you can tell Commander and Commander-Junior that I'll be out within the quarter-hour."

I had realised that my dad most likely had sent him in immediately, and had probably not even allowed him to have a fortifying gulp of coffee. It certainly explained my brother's apparent hurry to get me out of bed; he hadn't had anything to prepare himself for the battle that my sleepiness presented.

Virgil smirked at me in mischief before he turned without any further ado, vanishing back through the doorway that led to the front of the house. I could just about feel the smug waves that he was exuding from the success of his early-morning mission as he left; presumably to deliver my tidings word-for-word, and then eat his own breakfast.

I had no doubt that when I emerged they would try and force-feed me something that I really wasn't in the mood to eat. I was most likely going to be feeling unbearably ill well before the day was out, and if I had my way, there was  no way anywhere in the deepest pits of hell that I would be consuming anything that would give my stomach reason to eject partially digested food into a bowl; no matter how much my father insisted that breakfast was one of the most important meals of the day. But alas, I knew that it was not my choice to make, nor would I be able to escape without at least making an effort.

##

Not two hours later, I found myself reclined slightly uncomfortably on an examination bed in a private room, having the tube for my infusion line inserted.

The area was of course prepped and numbed by the strong local anaesthetic that had been injected not long after I had arrived, but like the spinal tap, I could very clearly feel the horrible feeling of a microscopic, wire-stiffened tube as it was threaded through one of the peripheral veins in my left arm.

Dr. Kingston had decided that we would make use of a PICC line this time around, rather than the Hickman implant again, due to the extra tubing that may possibly get caught on either the sling over my bad shoulder, or the brace that was still wrapped firmly around my midsection.

A Peripherally Inserted Central Catheter is a thinly-tubed line that runs from the entrance point at the crook of the patient's elbow, and finishes near the heart muscle. The line that I was going to be wearing was a triple-tubed masterpiece with extra ports available, just in case I needed something other than the cocktail of chemotherapy meds and the supplementary immunotherapy drugs and blood regulators that I would be taking to keep my body in a relatively balanced state.

My father and brothers, having come along for support, had been banished from the room for the procedure, although I could see Alan and Virgil watching over Dr Kingston's shoulder through the window.

I wished they wouldn't. I was trying to distract myself from the fact that my entire arm was going numb, and there they were, looking rather interested in the medical side of it. Maybe they had forgotten that it was me going through it, and not some other unfortunate soul, but, watching Gordon, my father and Scott, there was no way that  they were thinking of anything else but what was occurring.

By this time, Dr Kingston had finished imaging my chest to ensure that the placement was right, and was busily taping down the protruding tubes that were going to be a relatively permanent part of my anatomy for the foreseeable future.

"Okay, John." Dr Kingston told me. "We'll give you about an hour to an hour and a half to get acclimatised to the line, and then, around twelve-thirty, we'll move you into one of the treatment rooms." He clapped me on my good shoulder, and nodded, signalling for my family to come in.

"Cool!" Alan exclaimed, upon seeing the open-ended sock that I was in the process of pulling up over my elbow, rather clumsily because of my still-tender right arm, but I had to admit that the dark khaki half-sleeve was a pretty cool accessory, and as an added advantage, it hid the nauseating image of foreign objects penetrating my skin. It was definitely a plus when I needed all the help I could get to keep my renegade gut in line.

I really hated waking up; especially when this was the kind of thing I woke up to…


	20. The Beginning

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: If not for Sylvia and Gerry Anderson, I would not be able to play in this wonderful playground, so no, I do not own the Thunderbirds.  
> As always, I do not claim to be a doctor or a medical professional of any kind; any discrepancies in detail are my own fault.

Ow. Fuckity owie, crappity ouchie crap.

Yep. That was how much I was hurting. And really, it was much milder than what could have come out of my mouth. I usually preferred not to befoul the air with such terrible language —even if most of that air was within the confines of my own head— but this particular time, I thought that I could make an exception.

Around three-quarters of an hour following Dr Kingston's departure, I had begun to feel the beginnings of a headache.

I was sitting there with Dad and Gordon, talking quietly about the specs for Thunderbird Four that Brains had sent to me via the wrist comm. system, while Scott, Alan and Virgil took a trip down to the café for coffees and hot sweet tea to fortify the lot of us for the next few hours.

I grimaced slightly as I remembered the reason for the latter beverage. My father, Virgil, and Dr Kingston himself had all downright refused to even consider letting me have any concentrated amount of caffeine; only the lemon-laced tea, which was a suggestion from Onaha was to be the type of hot drink I was to be consuming. She and Kyrano had heard that it was helpful in terms of soothing of chemo symptoms, and despite my slight annoyance at the inability to have the hot drink that I so desired, I was inclined to trust them.

I'd managed to somehow, miraculously convince my father that I should be the one to be working with at reconfiguring the Thunderbirds' systems; reasoning to him that if I wasn't going to be allowed to help with the manual labour, I should at least be allowed to contribute to the brain work. If not, I was going to go certifiably and perhaps even irreparably insane if I was not to have anything to do in the interminable hours that I was to be sat on my backside in treatment therapy.

Brains was more of a higher-level genius than me –which was saying something, as my own IQ was well over 140– but despite his preternaturally advanced mind when it came to constructing machines and creating designs for ships that defied the laws of modern technology, the actual act of calibrating and programming the systems within them was much more my forte than his; though he could do it if circumstances forced him into the job.

At first I thought that the burgeoning throb that was beginning to unfurl from behind my eyes was merely a residual thing left over from the impact I had suffered at the bulkhead of 'Five, but as I found myself blinking more and more often from behind my glasses in an attempt to stave it off, I was of forced to admit that there was no way in heck that this was in any way an ordinary headache. I had also thought that it was also a result of the dull throbbing that was reverberating from the insertion site, all the way up my arm that I was feeling so off, so of course, stubborn Tracy that I was, I just had to ignore it until the pressure in my head imploded within my brain.

I was at the point that I was typing a complex string of algorithms and large, memorised chunks of binary code into the mainframe of my 'Bird for Brains and Fermat to tinker with later, after the older man had finished creating the advanced defence weaponry for each of IR's ships, when white-hot agony burst shockingly bright, large and razor-edged from practically nowhere. It stunned me into stillness, and making the luminous green print that was scrolling across the screen jolt both blurry and dizzy-fast; like demons possessed with their own form of radioactive strobe-light.

I felt, rather than saw or heard the laptop slip sideways off of my lap, and I nor did I hear any sound of something heavy impacting with the hardwood floor. But I could also have very well been wrong, seeing as it seemed that I had blacked out momentarily, losing all sense of thought, hearing and touch.

The coppery tang of blood flooded my mouth, and it was the only thing besides the iron hammer within my skull that I could completely sense, as I realised that I must have chomped down hard on my tongue. I screwed my eyes shut with all the force I could muster; my hand(s) flailing wildly as I grasped for leverage, as to not fall sideways to the floor, nor onto my face.

I wove drunkenly from side to side as arms clamped firmly down on my arms and chest, and then I heard flickers of questions from voices both familiar and unfamiliar. I couldn't distinguish brother from father from nurse from doctor, but I gathered from the scattered impressions, and vague recollections of prior experience, the general gist of the questions that were whirring busily and foggily around my brain.

Yes; I had said that I had been suffering from migraines over the past few days, but  Dear Mother of God in Heaven, why now did I have to have one so epicly proportionate to a detonated bomb? It just  had to make me dizzy and altogether sick, not forgetting the feeling that was equivalent to the crushing and cleaving power of an eight-ton anvil being dropped onto the top of my head… What possibly could I have done in all my time on the earth that was so bad that I deserved this?

I had had migraines before; a lot worse than the ones that my body had seen fit to throw at me lately, but never in my entire life had they been as severe as this one. My mother and Virgil both had suffered (and still suffered) from the skull-splitting, massively overwhelming ouchies, but not once had I wished to die more than I was right now.

It was some minutes later that I managed to claw my way back to something that even slightly resembled consciousness. I tentatively inched my eyes open a minute amount, only to clamp them instantly closed again, as the bright-white from the overhead lighting made me cry out. There were whispered words filtering into my brain from the vicinity of my left ear, and it took a huge amount of concentrated effort just to work up enough comprehension to realise what was being said to me.

Scott. I realised in confused relief. I was unsure why exactly he was here with me, but somehow knowing that he was fixing it; working the problem and finding a solution, gave made me happy. Just if it was hopefully and gladly not at the cost of my wellbeing.

A spare trace of random thought;  —thank God— then the sweet, blissful cold-fire of impending relief came flooding into my veins; welcome chilliness centred at the point of my new infusion line, snug and tight within the crook of my left elbow.

"I'sa Migrain'" It was an all-purpose answer; covering the inevitable questions, ranging from 'are you okay?" to 'what's wrong?', and even the good-old 'Do you feel sick?'. It sounded incoherent, and that was somewhat of an achievement when you considered the fact that it was coming from a guy whose head was in fact being bludgeoned from the inside out, and yet, I couldn't really find it in myself to care.

"John." The tendrils of the word were literally breathed into my ear, and I again thanked the Lord for having present at this time, the only brother who really knew just how badly these things could affect a person. "You can open your eyes when you're ready, Big Brother. The lights are off, and I've sworn everyone but Dr Kingston, me and you to silence, or I promised I'd lock 'em out the room."

I grinned wanly; my eyes still shut firmly, despite the no-light assurances, but I gathered enough of my bearing to mutter, "I bet you Scott would've taken that well. Dad too."

Virgil chuckled lowly, and I cringed as the sound echoed brutally inside my head, despite the quietness with which it was spoken. I scraped the dregs of my patience out of the barrel that was usually full, brimming and full of that of saints as I heard Dr Kingston begin to speak. I scowled and wondered rather viciously,  What in the hell do you want?

But I needn't have worried. All he really asked me was what I usually took for migraines, and he left without saying anything but that he'd '…give you an extra half-hour, but unfortunately it would be unwise to delay the first infusion for much longer.' Oh well. At least it was a start.

Still steadfastly refusing to open my eyes, I fumbled around with the blanket that some wonderfully kind brother had pulled up over me, and resolutely decided to try and sleep the earth-shattering monster out of existence before one pm.

##

Unfortunately, it came far too soon for my liking.

I was more-or-less still within a drug-induced haze when it came time for me to drag my sweatshirt and pyjama-clad self out of the hospital bed and into the hospital-prescribed doom-cart.

Fortunately, I had four brothers who were more than willing to do their bit in pushing and coaxing my overly-fuzzy body into the wheelchair that one of the orderlies had wheeled in. I was still too drugged-out-of-thumpy-headed-heaven to actually locate the gentlemanly manners that our parents had drilled into us, but Scott handled that part just fine.

All I had to do was close my eyes against the whirling scenery and try to ignore the duller-than-before-but-still-nauseating throb that seemed to have taken permanent residence up behind my eyes, and hope to God, the stars, and whoever else that may have proven to be listening that I wouldn't end up being sick before I even had anything done to me.

I had requested earlier this morning that only Scott and Virgil actually accompany me to my first infusion. As much as I adored my youngest brothers, and my father too, there was a line that must be drawn at times, and one of those includes not needing your impressionable younger brothers from seeing you at the lowest possible point you could be.

I wouldn't exactly have minded Dad there, but someone had to watch the Two. I had suggested that they take the time to head to town and show Alan the sights, because really, the kid hadn't been back to the area since we had come to Grandpa Tracy's funeral over four years ago, just after we had relocated to the island that was well on the way to becoming base for International Rescue. I knew that he wouldn't really remember much. And yes, Gordon was of age, but knowing the mischief he and Alan got up to, it was good that Dad was with them.

When the orderly dropped my brothers and me off at the doors to Room 312, my new 'happy spot' for the times in the next few months when I would be in Kansas, it was to find a friendly-ish cream-walled room that contained half-a-dozen well-worn couches, a rack of magazines, a bookcase filled with an array of different novels, and a large-plasma screen TV. There was a nurse with sandy-brown hair and a welcome smile waiting at one of the reclined couch-chairs that were scattered at random intervals around the room.

She was pretty, I thought distractedly, as I blinked wearily at her through half-lidded eyes; she wore the standard nurse's uniform, and had her hair tied back with a blue ribbon. The name on the ID tag around her neck read  Chantelle .

Chantelle was cheery and kind as she got me settled onto one of the couches that looked out onto the park across the street; not minding the presence of my brothers in the least as she deftly rinsed each lumen of the PICC line with a saline solution, and connected me to the drip and the first of the many bags of liquid that were going to make me 'better'.

Then, with a nod, she had politely said goodbye to me and my brothers, leaving the three of us alone in a room devoid of any patients but myself. No words had to be said, apart from a comment from Virgil at how pleasant the nurse's manner was, and then the three of us lapsed into a comfortable silence.

Virgil had himself plugged into the classical music he had stored on his iPod, and Scott contented himself with flipping the channels on the TV with the volume non-existent in deferral to my still sizeable headache. I was once again typing feverishly away on my laptop; steadfastly ignoring the kidney-shaped vomit-bowl in the hope that the thing I dreaded wouldn't come to fruition quite yet.

Naturally, what I wanted wasn't what I received. It may well have been as a result of anxiousness and fear that it happened, but I had tried making a bargain with myself earlier in the day; something along the lines of 'I will not puke until at least three hours after the infusion'. Everyone knows though, that a body often has a remarkably different idea to what your heart and mind might prefer. If things had been different, I certainly wouldn't have chosen to be anywhere close to my current predicament. The migraine certainly wasn't helping matters. I was usually vomiting at this point of one anyway.

It began with what initially felt like a rumbling in the pit of my stomach. Not quite hunger-pains, but that stupid stage where your stomach feels like there's something warm sitting there, and you aren't exactly sure that you can do anything about it. I pushed it down; unwilling to believe that it had come on not even thirty minutes into what was supposed to be a six-hour appointment. Then there was that hot, sick nauseous feeling in my chest beneath my sternum. No matter how many sips of lemon tea I took to try and quell it, it seemed to grow substantially stronger with each passing minute. I assumed that my sensitivity to the chemotherapy was affecting my body's resistance to it.

It got to the point where I was staring fixedly at a point on the ceiling, counting silently to myself as I watched both Scott and Virgil watching me covertly from the corners of their eyes. I could tell that the both of them were poised to lunge for the nearest chuck-bucket as soon as it appeared that I was going to hurl, and I loved them for it.

I was just about to ask my younger brother if he could possibly pass me the thermos of tea so that I could have one sip, when my resistance suddenly fell with all the swiftness of Thunderbird Three launching from her silo.

Bile, vomit and spew; a disgusting mess of mostly-watery tea and the remains of the sole piece of dry toast that I had managed for breakfast, re-emerged with all the force of a gushing river.

I choked bitterly on the sour taste of it as it burned its way into the bowl that Scott was holding steadily beneath my chin, and I thought wistfully back to a now just-out-of-reach time where I had been happy, whole and safe.

But that was in the past now. It was time to move forward and fight.


End file.
